


Tale of a Tabris

by apostate (394percentdone)



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Panic Attacks, Trans Male Character, nightmares:body horror
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-06-23
Packaged: 2019-12-31 21:56:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18322736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/394percentdone/pseuds/apostate
Summary: The story of Ellanis Tabris -Apostate, Warden, Hero.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> well! here we go!
> 
> cw for a nightmare with some body horror/gore its all italicized and skippable at the end

Lothering reeks of unfulfilled potential. Stinks like wasted dreams and manure spread too thin on dusty soil. Ellanis takes a deep breath through his nose, lets the stench sit on his tongue and linger in his throat, savoring the taste of air not bound by walls. There’s a certain kind of purity in the evening out here something Ellanis never noticed missing before now. A beauty to the fields and the sun beginning to set and the awful, awful stink of freshly manured farms. 

No duty in this moment, no weight hanging from his shoulders, no decisions to be made. Just peace. Even breaths while watching a sunset in the middle of nowhere in particular. Ellanis rests his weight on his cane, letting it hold him upright without thinking about it, and breathes. 

Breathes for the first time in almost a month.

This is how it is now. Reminders in the ash on the back of his tongue and in the empty hope of flames. Breathes and the world turns around him, it always has. Ellanis finds the horizon stretched out ahead of him in a moment of peace before he’ll have to return to camp. Even thinking about camp causes Ellanis’ head to fall back with a vague groan. 

Maker give him strength. Three humans all at odds with each other stuck in a camp about the size of his thumb with a sullen qunari and a dog. A late evening breeze lifts the flyaways escaping from his bun into his face, thin black strands getting stuck in his mouth. Wonderful. 

What is he even doing? Standing in a field in the middle of nowhere, a pointless effort to save the people in a village who won’t even listen to them. Ellanis huffs the hair from his face and grimaces. He didn’t even want this, whatever this is. But it's his now whether he likes it or not. Maybe he could walk away, but where would he go? Not back to Denerim not after what he’s done.

And maybe that’s best. 

To have nothing to return to except the setting sun and his own thoughts. An expanse of endless horizon, Ellanis’ fingers itch for a sketchbook left in a place he can no longer call home. Jumps, ears flicking, when he hears a tsk from behind him.

“Most unusual to find you out here brooding without company.” Morrigan’s unsurprised tone doesn’t match her words but Ellanis finds he doesn’t mind. 

Out of them, Morrigan is… Safer. Human, yes, but an apostate the same as he is and her comfort in her magic is something Ellanis has only seen once before. “And how is it unusual for me to avoid the company of strangers?” 

Face scrunching Ellanis wonders if, perhaps, he hadn’t touched on the heart of his problem. Strangers. The ragtag group he is, apparently, collecting is made of strangers. He doesn’t know them and they do not know him -and that makes them dangerous. Ellanis sighs, reminding himself he can’t be arrested for apostasy anymore with a shudder of his shoulders and a shiver down his spine. And even if he could -but Ellanis stops the thought before it can finish. 

“Did you come out here for me or were you looking for a moment’s peace yourself?” Ellanis tilts his head towards Morrigan with his question, shifting his weight back to his good leg. 

Morrigan doesn’t smile but there’s something Ellanis could mistake for warmth in her voice, “Could you not consider the possibility I came looking for both?” 

No, he hadn’t actually. “Camp feeling a bit cramped?” Turning just slightly enough to invite Ellanis looks back towards the fields, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much empty space before.” 

“‘Tis different from the wilds as well. Though stranger still is your experience I fear.” Morrigan takes his offer and comes up to stand beside Ellanis both of them watching the sunset. 

Humming Ellanis doesn’t try and prolong a conversation neither of them are looking for. They stand out there for a handful of minutes, appreciating the simplicity of another body without asking for anything else. It could have been peaceful even if they were not who they are and where. Wind continues to blow, the sun continues to sink, and Ellanis continues to breathe. 

He breaks the silence first, a thought lodged in his mind for a while now. “What do you make of all this anyway? Forced from your home and made to travel with strangers. If you don’t mind my prying that is.” 

“If I minded I wouldn’t be here would I?” Morrigan tosses him a courtesy glance and Ellanis quirks his lips. “I suppose it is what I wanted, in some way, to get out of the Wilds and see the rest of the world. Wanderlust I called it, stupidity is the name my mother used. There are only so many things you can learn in the same patch of forest.”

Ellanis nods but Morrigan’s eyes narrow slightly. “Don’t mistake my reasons for your own mind you. I could ask you the very same since you haven’t spoken a word concerning your life before we met.”

Laughing ruefully Ellanis turns his gaze back to the horizon to avoid the curious look in Morrigan’s eyes. “You could. But it doesn’t matter now so why dwell on what was instead of focusing on what can be hmm?” It isn’t an artful dodge Ellanis knows, but he rolls his shoulders anyway. “If, by Andraste’s grace, there is a point to all of this I doubt it will show itself by simply moping about it.” 

“And here I thought you wanted to play a hero.” Morrigan turns to match his stance, relaxed and open. “Why did you go about town today as you did then, if not to atone for something?”

Mouth drying Ellanis opens his mouth with a protest on his tongue but bites it before the words form. Thinks them over and reshapes them. Does Morrigan think his actions atonement? She wouldn’t be… far from the truth if Ellanis wanted to be honest with himself. But not quite. Ellanis shakes his head, a flash of a chastized smile. 

“There is a difference between atonement and altruism, though I am doing neither. Does it ease your consciousness if I tell you I helped the family robbed by bandits because I remember what it is like to be penniless? Or that I wanted to find the boy’s mother because I know how he felt looking for her? Why did I allow Sten or Leliana to join us?” Ellanis tips his head back, eyes focused on the purple bruise of the sky. “I thought they would be useful and I like being useful myself.” 

Morrigan scoffs, “I see. And perhaps the standing outside, far from camp and everyone in it, is being useful as well.” But, Morrigan being Morrigan she drops the line of questions almost on a whim. “Though both of us seem to be standing here now.” 

“Maybe.” Laughing in spite of himself Ellanis faces Morrigan fully, “We talk about this like we both don’t know exactly what we’re avoiding.” 

Her lips are curled up and there is a glint in her eyes. Morrigan chuckles in response and Ellanis doesn’t drop his own smile. “Isn’t that the fun of it? ‘Twould be dull if we spoke only of points and things and did not dance around them.”

“Dull indeed.” They’re standing close enough Ellanis could reach out if he wanted. An elbow to the arm or a hand on the shoulder. But he hasn’t reached out in too long now and he doesn’t want to start. So he doesn’t. Lets the moment pass by him in an odd almost. “Do you suppose the others have actually made camp yet or do you think we’ll come back to chaos?”

Shrugging Morrigan turns back towards the direction she came from, “When I took my leave of them they were bickering about something I think about who gets to bunk with the dog.” 

Chaos then. Ellanis huffs, “Of course they are.” He pivots on his good foot, cane pressed down in the thawing earth, and nods at Morrigan. “Care to come back with me? Never know what’s gonna come out of these fields.” 

This time Morrigan is the one chuckling, “Are you afraid to try and corral them yourself?” But she’s already falling into step beside him, keeping his slightly slower pace.

“They’re more afraid of you which speaking of usefulness…” Ellanis trails off playfully, warmth still bubbling in his chest. “Come on you know you love to threaten to turn them into frogs. What’s the point of not having some fun with them?”

Snapping her fingers at him Morrigan threatens him with a smirk, “They’re not the only ones I can transform. Don’t push your luck yourself, Ellanis, maybe if I turned  _ you _ into a worm you’d stop jabbering at me.” 

“Ah, but then who else would listen to you continue on?” Ellanis grins, they were not truly too far from camp, perhaps only a few minutes walk. But it felt, nice, familiar almost in a way Ellanis doesn’t want to look at too closely, to talk with Morrigan. 

Ellanis feels more than sees Morrigan roll her eyes. “My words don’t need to be heard, they’re for myself not anyone else.” 

“Of course, of course.” Letting the conversation lull Ellanis takes the opportunity to watch the countryside around them. With the setting of the sun, there isn’t much light left, other than the soft moonlight falling on the muddy path. Open fields and farmhouses, a handful of cows settling down for the night. Wind blowing in a gentle spring breeze bringing the heavy foulness of manure. 

Ellanis still isn’t used to how empty it is. No rickety houses stacked upon one another, no zigzagging tiny streets made more of dead-ends than destinations, no walls blocking the sunrise from view, no guards lingering just waiting for an excuse. Just fields and the horizon and the moons. It’s funny, almost, in how it’s everything he wanted and now everything he wishes to be rid of. 

What a fool.

They reach camp quietly, Morrigan heading for her own tent set up in its own removed area. The others are scattered slightly around a campfire Ellanis isn’t sure who started. Leliana sits closest to the fire, thin chantry robes pulled close around her shoulders. She looks up as Ellanis approaches and smiles. 

It surprises him. Maybe it shouldn’t but try as he might Ellanis can’t think of the last time a chantry sister smiled at him. Her smile is warm and bright not unlike the fire before her and Ellanis doesn’t know if he can trust her or not. So he simply nods in her direction.

She isn’t alone though, Sten and Alistair sit around the fire as well, an awkward half-circle of avoiding eyes. Only Lucky seems happy to see him, the mabari wagging her tail excitedly. Ellanis gets half a warning out before she bounds over and almost knocks him over. Almost only because Ellanis managed to twist out of the way just before she got to him. 

“Hello to you too Lucky.” He gives her head a pat but looks over at Alistair who had her beside him before she leapt up. “Is there a plan for taking watch or are we drawing lots?” 

“Sten agreed for the third watch, I’ll take first or second up to you.” Lucky makes her way back to Alistair and plops down beside him again, tongue lolling out of her mouth. Without seeming to think about it Alistair begins to pet her, looking up at Ellanis with a shrug. “I don’t really care which honestly.” 

Humming in the back of his throat Ellanis considers it, they’ll be leaving at daybreak for Orzammar the start of a fortnight’s journey through Maker knows what kind of weather through the foothills of the Frostbacks. He’ll need every ounce of strength he can muster to make the journey but at the same time. So will Alistair.

“I’ll take second tonight.” It isn’t as if he was going to sleep anyway, not with his recent track record. Ears twitching in memory Ellanis fights down a grimace.

Sten stands abruptly, “Wake me when you have need of me.” Leaving without another word Sten disappears into his tent raised nearby. 

Frowning Ellanis watches him retreat, the qunari hasn’t spoken unless directly spoken to and sometimes not even then. For all the questions Ellanis has he never receives an answer beyond silence. Not that he hasn’t tried asking. 

Leliana stretches before she, too, announces her need for ‘a good night’s sleep’. It almost gets a laugh from Ellanis but he stifles it quickly. It isn’t… It just isn’t for him to laugh with her. But with just him and Alistair and Lucky, the emptiness of the fields around them turns from comfort to threat. Nightfall brings peace in the same measure it brings danger. 

Raising his free hand to tuck loose hair back behind his ear Ellanis forces his thoughts into some sort of order. Tries to anyway. One thing at a time is what he needs to focus on. 

“You should get some rest too Ellanis.” Alistair prompts, pulling Ellanis from his head. “I’ll wake you for your watch or, maybe, if one of the cows is actually a darkspawn.” 

Ellanis allows himself a smile at that one, “Can’t be too careful.” 

Words he’s lived by, each letter pressed like a shackle around his soul. One mistake is all it took, arrest just around the corner. Maker, what is wrong with him tonight? Ellanis shakes his head and swallows dryly, “Thanks, I’ll be heading off.” 

Alistair just nods and Ellanis takes his leave. Heads for his own tent pitched not far from the fire, thoughts swirling unresolved in his head. Simple bedroll and a single lamp greet him as he ducks inside and he doesn’t bother to fumble around for his tinder box so instead Ellanis sits, cane resting on the ground next to him, and strips off the grey and blue tabard in the dark. Reaches up and finds the leather strip holding his hair in place and tugs it free.

Lies back against the soft fur lining and breathes. Apprehension bubbles in his gut, sleep has never been something he craves and now, with the blasted taint humming under his skin, dreaming is more danger than he wants. Eyes closing, sweat prickling between his fingers, Ellanis lies to himself and tries to relax. 

Fear only makes the nightmare worse. 

Exhaustion pulls at him, a month of travel wears down his endurance and weighs down on his chest. A game of chance he can’t win. One he’s played every night since he was six, a game of will and strength and determination. He only came close to losing once before. Ellanis squeezes his eyes shut further, willing the thought away. It’s as he told Morrigan earlier, Andraste doesn’t show her reasons through dwelling on one’s past. 

Maker guide him. Ellanis raises an arm over his eyes and deepens his breathing, his watch will creep up on him if he isn’t careful and Ellanis knows it won’t be easier if he hasn’t slept. Lets himself drift, formless thoughts floating through his mind but he refuses to acknowledge them. Falling, hoping for peace. 

_ Burning heat licks the scorched air, parched dust blooming in eddies driven by the gold and crimson storm. Ellanis stands in the center both hands raised to the sky where he can watch them crack and crumble; skin like charcoal, blood like fire. Voices ringing out in the inferno a thousand parched throats singing a fractured offkey hymn, praising the remains of a god bound to a festering carcass, a dragon who guides and destroys.  _

_ Ash on his tongue and flames in his lungs. Good knee collapsing with nothing to help him stand, bending under his weight too far but Ellanis doesn’t notice. Corruption in his veins remaking him, shaping him until he is no longer anything he once was. Bone shattering and flesh melting, the only constant is the song.  _

_ Lightning cracks through the fire the sky above him as angry as what remains of his hands. Purple and ominous and powerful. Humming and shouting and singing. Ellanis pulls his hands down and tears at his chest, nails broken and jagged and sharp enough to rip through the rags hanging limply off his frame.   _

_ Rends the meat from his ribs pouring thick and viscous blood onto the dust. Matching the hot lines dripping down his face. It splatters in black pools, the last of what binds him to the earth. Singing in screams. Unmaking. The beauty of it bringing ecstasy and the flames around him soar.  _

_ He can see it, hear it,  _ taste  _ it. The archdemon fills the sky with wings of glittering decay, roars with a voice broken beyond understanding, breathes with air infused with the stench of death. Ellanis just needs to reach them, has to reach them, the call bleeding out from between his gory fingernails compels him and Ellanis will obey. _

_ Will drag himself through a raging storm of flame and lighting, hand over hand pulling himself through the blackened soil. Leaving nothing but a trail of ruined blood in his wake.  _

Ellanis jolts upright. Heart hammering in his chest hands scrambling to find skin where his brain screamed there was none. Gasping breaths, a hiccup in the otherwise silent night. Ellanis nearly sobs with relief as his fingers, soft and scarred but not seared, find nothing but his own heartbeat thumping under his skin. Curls up on himself to press his forehead to his good knee trembling in the darkness. 

He was a fool for even trying to sleep. There is no rest to be found, not for him. Ellanis clenches his jaw tight and balls his hands into fists only to release them a moment later. Control. Above all Ellanis is in control. A single dream will not deter him, nor will a hundred or a thousand. There is no sense in losing sight of what he must do and Ellanis knows this is only the beginning. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> fights are won and choices are made

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :3

Morning dawns too bright and too soon. Sunlight cuts through the gap in the flaps of his tent striking Ellanis’ eyelids and pulling him from the doze he’d finally managed to fall into. Rolling onto his side Ellanis grumbles, shielding his eyes from the sun he doesn’t want to acknowledge. Formless thoughts start to swim through his head and Ellanis curls up tighter.

They’re less than a week out from Orzammar, skirting Lake Calenhad and every step closer has Ellanis’ teeth on edge. Kinloch Hold sits in the back of his mind, a carrion bird circling overhead waiting for him to make one single mistake. Ellanis groans, it's too early for paranoia. 

Huffing, Ellanis pushes himself into partially sitting up. Soft orange and gold greets him as he blearily blinks awake and Ellanis frowns at the sunlight. Fumbling for his tabard Ellanis tries reaching for it without actually moving and gets exactly as far as he dreaded he would. Giving it up for a moment he cards a hand through his hair, detangling it with his fingers before tying it up. 

Maker he really hates mornings. He finishes getting around, groggily pulling himself together and tries to put on a presentable face before stepping outside into the dawn. Thankfully, the only other person awake so far is Alistair who is vaguely poking at the embers of last night’s fire. Ellanis yawns and immediately regrets it, the cold air coming off the lake doesn’t go down well in gulps. 

It’s several hours before camp is packed up and they’re able to head out. Each minute weighs Ellanis down, settles between his ribs and sticks like the burned coffee he drinks. Ridiculous. Shaking his head Ellanis focuses back on the road, walking somewhere in the middle of the group, too slow to lead but still managing to keep pace. 

The day bleeds into the rest of them, a continuous motion of one step followed by another. Trickles of conversation, of ribbing back and forth as strangers find their footing with each other, though Ellanis’ own thoughts aren’t concerned too much with them. It isn’t until a woman in a tattered dress comes running towards the group with a tear stricken face that he’s able to narrow himself to the single road before him.

“Help us! Please!” Tripping over herself in her haste the woman comes close to landing in a heap in front of them. “Will you please help us? Our caravan got ambushed by bandits and my husband is injured. There hasn’t been anyone come by here all day and there isn’t anything I can do.” Hysteria chokes her words to match the shake in her hands but Ellanis narrows his eyes glances over at Morrigan.

Her nod and shrug tell him she’s at least seeing the same things he is. 

Alistair is already helping the woman stand, his hand on her shoulder. “Of course we can help, just show us where your caravan is.” 

“Point us in the direction and we’ll head there after you, give us a moment to grab some tools first.” Ellanis interrupts before Alistair can continue, _'_ _Maker he really could be a good-natured idiot'_ , Ellanis thinks, biting back a sigh. 

The woman nods her mouth falling open to thank them and Andraste as she points, “We’re just beyond the hills, thank you sers!” She doesn’t hesitate to hurry back along the path she took to reach them either. Ellanis watches her scurry back with a purse of his lips. 

“Alistair, you know that’s a trap right?” Ellanis almost regrets asking, his already thin patience stretched further by Alistair’s affronted quirk of his brows. 

Scoffing Alistair counters, “A weak one  _ if _ at all seeing as we’re not exactly unarmed.” 

“Would you like me to list all of the signs pointing towards ‘do not engage’ or ‘obvious trap’? Just because we’re armed doesn’t mean she isn’t.” Morrigan adds on his heels glancing at him down her nose. She shifts her gaze toward Ellanis, “At least one of you is able to see clearly.” 

“There’s no need to go that far Morrigan, but really Alistair? Did you not see it?” Maker take them all honestly Ellanis is tired. A week and a half of walking, not to mention bickering, is wearing him down already. Everything is on edge and he just wants to be far away from the shadow cast by memories and paranoia. 

Alistair scowls, “So what? And who knows maybe they really do need help and you’re just being stingy.” His leg twitches as if he wants to kick at the dust in the road, “Let’s at least go see?”

“It’s obviously a trap. Her boots were muddy but the hem of her dress was clean, her accent is different than what I have come to expect from Fereldens, and she had at least two concealed daggers on her person.” Sten speaks up for the first time since Ellanis greeted him this morning and Ellanis turns his head to nod in his direction. “If you cannot understand to at least approach with caution then you should not approach at all.”

It seems he’s been underestimating Sten still. Ellanis lets their eyes meet for a brief moment, taking in Sten’s closed face and bored eyes. It’s the same assessment Ellanis made, though he hadn’t seen the daggers, and why he had interjected before Alistair could continue putting themselves in danger. 

“Exactly, Sten, thank you.” He shifts his attention back to Alistair with a slight sigh. “We can check them out, bandits on the road are not as much as a problem for us as they are for most travelers but we can’t just rush in offering aid to every busybody on the street. Our resources are limited and should be treated as such, and that includes our time. Does that make sense Alistair? If you are right and they’re just people in unfortunate circumstances we can do what we can, but if not it is better to err on the side of caution here. So, here’s what we’ll do.

“Morrigan if you would investigate as a crow, fly over where the woman went and report back. Sten, Alistair, you’ll be in the vanguard in front of Leliana and myself we’ll approach with caution until Morrigan lets us know the situation. From there we can decide if they’re just travelers, bandits we can deal with, or bandits we avoid.” 

The words flow once he begins, order and plans forming in his mind as he thinks the situation through. He isn’t sure where they come from but he’s grateful for them all the same. Even if they weigh oddly on his tongue and sit strangely in his chest, too big and too awkward and too… Too much like someone else. Ellanis followed before and now here he is giving the orders. He isn’t sure he likes it either. 

Pushing those thoughts down Ellanis looks at the ragtag group he’s collected, “Well?” 

A smattering few nods and a bit of unhurried motion later and they’re doing just what Ellanis said -Sten and Alistair are at the front of their little formation, Leliana and himself fanned out behind them. Morrigan circles overhead, already watching the hillside the mystery woman had vanished over. Frown pulling at Ellanis lips he keeps his eyes on her, glancing up every now and then as they hike slowly over towards her position. 

In the brief handful of minutes it takes for them to arrive Morrigan scouts the area, transforming back into herself the moment the others are ready. “It’s an ambush, not too large but they don’t look to be regular bandits either. Something is, off, about them. I would say they’re too well armed, or perhaps to organized, but I do not think it is this which alarms me.”

Ellanis nods thoughtfully, “It isn’t as if we are without enemies. Perhaps… How many do you think there are, you said not large. Do you mean small enough to overpower or simply not an army.” 

“Enough to be dangerous.” Looking directly at Alistair Morrigan directs her next words mostly at Ellanis, making him roll his eyes. “More than what I’d like to stumble upon, though I doubt we would be outmatched significantly.” 

“Well, we’ve come this far. No reason to shy away.” He shrugs, “Plus we’ll need money for supplies and they must have some coin.” Nodding at Sten and Alistair he continues, “Let’s see what they’re after.”

The clearing they walk into is pristine, mid-afternoon spring sunlight falling onto fresh green grass. A neat road bisects the handful of hills and a few pieces of spilled supply crates lie scattered around a broken wagon. The woman from before is standing in the middle of the road, next to an elf who looks incredibly out of place in the idyllic countryside. 

Blonde hair shines in the sun, dark skin covered by darker leather, glinting golden eyes over a pair of daggers. In the heartbeat of silence before battle Ellanis meets his eyes and finds an empty yawning hollowness. 

“The grey wardens die here!”

And time quickens. Metal slides on leather from multiple directions, Leliana’s quiver rattles as she searches for an arrow, and Ellanis focuses on the pull of his magic. Forms a spirit brace around his bum leg and raises his cane as a staff, letting the draw of energy wash over him. Reaching out first for the woman who met them out on the road, the shy look of her youthful face dropped in favor of a vicious snarl. It’s her bad luck she is the closest to him. 

There isn’t sound or flash to accompany Ellanis’ magic but there is the taste of metal in his mouth. He finds the eddies of her, the slips and whirls of the entirety of her being and hand outstretched Ellanis tugs on one of the currents. Knots inside her, those little places of disorder. An irregular heartbeat, a lingering sickness in her lungs, an old infection in her hip. Ellanis finds them and unravels them. 

Takes her breath first, it’s the easiest to upset. The woman gasps hesitates for a fraction of a second in her dash towards Sten and Alistair, a look of confusion crossing her face. Horror comes second. Mouth opening and closing, lungs heaving in her chest Ellanis closes his fist and fills her lungs with his magic in the place of air. Her eyes bulge and the already rapid beating of her heart accelerates. Falters. 

Ellanis has learned hearts are fallible. His magic digs into the center of her chest moves from the ruin of her lungs to the ever so slightly misshapen heart. A healer knows the sound of a heartbeat and Ellanis can hold this woman’s heart in his hands and know if he just introduces a little more chaos, a little more disorder, her heart won’t keep its rhythm. So he does. Lets his magic disrupt the even beats with something a little more disorganized. 

And this time the woman stops completely. The shock of her expression curls Ellanis’ lip and the tinge of blue creeping along the outside of her eyes and around her mouth twists it further. It’s his least favorite part this. Death. Ellanis can count all of the lives he’s taken and he adds her to the total staining his hands. She doesn’t even make it within reach of the two warriors in front, dropping her daggers with twin ringing clangs to clutch at her chest, knees giving out with her air. The woman dies before her back hits the ground.

But the skirmish continues without her. Ellanis turns his attention to the next bandit, an archer hidden behind a lopsided crate, and repeats. And repeats. And repeats. This time an injured shoulder just waiting to give out under Sten’s brutal attacks, the next a poorly healed ankle ready to roll just as Alistair slams his shield into them, another with lungs like cobwebs and Ellanis breathes a choking filling miasma into them to pop them like an overfilled waterskin.

Around him the ring of metal on metal rises into the air, the hiss of conjured fire singes his ear, the twang of bowstrings mixes into a cacophony of death. Stepping lightly and dodging Ellanis keeps out of the melee knowing if he gets within blade distance he’ll be useless. But so long as he stays out of reach.

Ellanis watches the number fall one by one. Feels it, intimately, as his magic steals and disharmonizes the life out of everyone he reaches out for. Wishes he could close his eyes and will himself back to the days when the only crimson dripping from his hands was the paint he used to capture the fading sun. But he doesn’t. Can’t. 

Draws strength from their corpses instead. Consumes the lingering energy before it can dissipate into nothingness and uses it to fuel his brace and attacks. Isn’t paying attention to the cold shadow flickering in the corner of his vision. Ellanis is focused, driven, legs planted in the dirt with his hands raised to conduct a symphony of death. And he forgets the chinks in his own armor. 

The first strike only misses because Ellanis slips in the mud. The clear shine of a dagger in bright sunlight blinds him for a moment but Ellanis twists, nearly falling, to evade the second blow. He isn’t fast but he is flexible and the third strike Ellanis sees coming. Glinting steel materializes from the air, a figure now visible in the air, shimmering as his stealth is dropped. It aims for his chest, or his shoulder Ellanis isn’t sure but he bends out of reach all the same. 

The golden-haired stranger with empty eyes hisses at him. Swiping with the dagger held in his other hand and, finally, manages to snag Ellanis’ tabard. Cane in hand Ellanis strikes back, sweeping out in front of him to try and knock the man off balance. It only works in forcing the man to jump back slightly out of reach. 

Their eyes meet. Golden on brown fading to grey. The stranger’s eyes are squinting in the sunlight, a snarl twisting his lips and bringing his brow together. But there’s something, forced about it and Ellanis holds the man’s gaze even as he approaches one more with daggers drawn. It’s… Ellanis stifles the traitorous thought of familiar before he can act on it. Whatever he thinks must be solely on the fight.

His magic cannot help him here, even if he were quick enough to unwind the threads of the man’s life before he could reach Ellanis he wouldn’t be able to do it without sacrificing too much power. There is little his cane can do to protect him either, made for walking the wood is too thin to deal anything like real damage and it’s too dangerous to try and use it as a weapon. 

In the moment Ellanis takes to blink the man is before him again, eyes swallowing Ellanis’ vision. For all his face is animated his eyes are blank. Empty. Ellanis gasps, the air forced from his lungs in response to his tabard catching the brunt of the dagger’s attack, though he’s sure it will leave a sizable bruise. But there is no triumph in the stranger’s expression, only hollow movements followed one after another. 

A heartbeat thumps against his ribs and Ellanis knows the eyes of the stranger trying to kill him. Knows the emptiness they carry and the weight of hollow duty. Knows it all too well, wore it once himself not two months ago. The silence of a wedding broken not by the chime of bells but by the clang of swords. 

Ellanis falters. A fraction of a second. That’s all it takes. 

Actively pursuing death, a farewell to the mistakes and pain and guilt. An attack done not for victory but for atonement. For peace all the same. Ellanis finds the eyes of the stranger, bright gold hard and cold and so tired, meets them in the space between heartbeats and raises his hands to give the man what he’s seeking. 

Reaches for the muddied currents of the man before him to grab hold of his beating heart. Weights and measures the turbulence swirling in his chest against the nothing in his eyes and Ellanis makes a decision he’s sure he’ll regret later. 

Instead of closing his fist and stopping the stranger’s heart he turns instead to the eddies of the golden-haired man’s mind and quiets them. Brings up his cane a moment too slow to completely block the dagger slashing towards his stomach -grunting with the force of it sliding against his mail. But already the stranger is starting to slow. 

Confusion blinks across his face, the first real expression Ellanis has seen there. Ellanis finds a thread of exhaustion, heavy and thick and winding through the man’s entire being.  _ Perfect _ . Pulling on it Ellanis dodges the next attack with comparable ease, the stranger with familiar eyes coming at him messily. Swings lose and wide and Ellanis tugs one last time before the wobble overtakes the stranger and he falls to the ground by Ellanis’ feet. 

Ringing in his ears nearly overpowers the sound of his panting, breath coming quick and harsh as he doubles over leaning on his cane. He’s overexerted himself. The drain of mana aches at the base of his skull, throbbing in time with the heartbeat hammering against the inside of his chest. All of him a bruise. Ellanis lets his brace dissipate and glances around what remains of the ambush, hair falling in his face and sticking to his forehead but he can’t find the energy brush it back. 

The fight has all but died down, Sten and Alistair surround the last archer while Leliana and Morrigan survey just as Ellanis is doing. From what he can see the only one left alive is the one he spared. Taking a deep breath only to release it in a sigh Ellanis waves to gain the others attention and practices an explanation in his head. 

‘ _ We can use him for information. _ ’ Maybe, but not strong enough on its own. ‘ _ We need every edge we can claim. _ ’ Better but still... a half truth. Ellanis avoids the nagging voice, smaller and insidious, telling him the real reason he spared the golden-eyed stranger’s life. 

“What have we here?” Morrigan’s voice yanks Ellanis out of his head. “A survivor? Well, what are you waiting for Ellanis finish him off.” Surprise tinges her voice the unsure crease between her brow asking Ellanis more than her question. 

Ellanis shrugs, “I figured he’d have some useful information and since we need every drop of information we can get…” He trails off running a hand through his hair. “He won’t stay asleep for long so we’ll need to decide fast.”

Leliana and Alistair speak at the same time, voices rolling over each other for a moment before they cut off looking between them.

“I don’t think it’s a bad-” 

“Oh, I’m the dumb one for walking-”

Morrigan rolls her eyes. “It isn’t a bad idea but what are you planning on doing with him after you ask your questions?” There’s something strange in how she asks it and Ellanis flicks his gaze to hers and finds it curiously closed. She doesn’t normally keep things from him, but, Ellanis reminds himself, how well do they know each other really?

“That depends on how he answers.” Simple answers can conceal far better than complex ones and Ellanis has always been good at hiding. 

If she suspects anything Morrigan doesn’t call him on it, not yet anyway. She simply gestures towards the man still lying on the ground with a flourish. “Then by all means.”

Ellanis looks around the others, “Any objections?” If the silence that follows is broken by shuffling feet it isn’t broken by words so Ellanis nods. Too tired to wake the stranger with magic Ellanis shifts his weight to his good leg and pokes the man with his cane quickly. It shouldn’t take too much to wake him, the effects of Ellanis’ magic are short-lived, especially so if he runs out of mana while casting. 

Thankfully the golden-haired man groans the second time Ellanis pokes him, raising his head with furrows creasing his forehead. He mumbles something none of them catch but blinks and seems to ground himself. “I rather thought I would wake up dead, or not wake up at all as the case may be. But I see you haven’t killed me yet.”

His voice is lilting and strange, accent tilting his words into something wholly unfamiliar. Ellanis blinks caught off guard by the man’s voice and mentally shakes himself. “Yet is the word you should focus on.” 

The man laughs unafraid but it doesn’t reach his eyes. Eyes Ellanis can’t bring himself to look away from. “Is it? Are all Fereldens this straightforward or are you a treat not only on the eyes?” Before Ellanis can gather a response he continues, leaving Ellanis to splutter on air. “If it is questions you plan on asking me, let me save time and get straight to the point.” 

In the span of a few minutes the stranger, Zevran, spins a story of plotting and danger and death. Of plotting in shadows and assassinating in daylight. Of failure and the consequences. When interrupted and questioned Zevran doesn’t hesitate to answer spilling all manner of pretty words from his mouth. Ellanis watches him for the whole explanation, breaks down his expressions and his voice and the new glint of  _ something _ in his eyes. He speaks of skills and opportunity and second chances and Ellanis already knows his answer -knew it the moment he spared him. 

“So? What shall it be hm? There are many things I can offer and-” 

Ellanis cuts him off, holding his free hand out to help Zevran stand. “Death is a waste.” He doesn't say anything else, not for a moment. Just holds Zevran’s gaze as he held his heart in the heat of battle, “Make use of your life.”

Zevran’s hand in his is solid and warm. He grips Ellanis’ wrist with a steely force and Ellanis pulls him upward into the mid-afternoon sun to stand on a bloodsoaked field. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> why does ellanis have to make all the decisions

Alistair waits until they’re nearly at Orzammar’s gate before he voices his concerns. Or, rather, does something other than giving a snide response about cloaks and daggers when asked questions while shooting Zevran a suspicious glance. A week of passive aggressive comments and no actual action on any of them is wearing the last of Ellanis’ patience paper thin. But, Ellanis supposes, there’s something to be said about Alistair’s ability to sulk without it getting too in the way. 

He slows down to walk beside Ellanis and Morrigan in the rear and Alistair gives Ellanis a loaded look and already Ellanis wants whatever conversation he has planned to be over. Counting to ten internally Ellanis gives Alistair a place to start, hoping to cut off any unnecessary rambling before he can get started, “Having a problem? You look concerned about something.” 

Frown contorting his face Alistair almost looks like Lucky did when she ate a rancid piece of meat off the road. “Problem? No.” He draws the words out each vowel taking at least a full second longer than they should. “I don’t have a problem, what makes you think that?” 

Ellanis doesn’t even get to open his mouth before Alistair continues. 

“Don’t answer that. I may, uh, have concerns though. Which I know we didn’t really talk about them before but maybe we should. I don’t know how, or like maybe, that you don’t have a problem with  _ him _ . I haven’t seen you, not even once, not calm about having someone who tried to kill us in our camp.”

“Did I say I trust him?” Ellanis gestures with his free hand, a wide sweeping motion in front of himself, “There’s a reason I don’t allow him to take a watch and it isn’t because I’m concerned about his rest. So far Zevran’s pulled his own weight and I don’t hear him complaining about your snoring, which I could argue is as deadly and we allow you in camp.”

Face crumpling Alistair doesn’t quite pout but it’s close. “I don't snore… That bad. But that’s not all of either, he could betray us at any time and you’re just-” Frustration bleeds into Alistair’s voice, crinkles the corners of his eyes. “You’re so calm about it. It’s like you’re not reacting, or like you don’t even care. Can’t you just freak out like the rest of us for bringing an assassin into this?”

Ellanis snorts, “Freak out like you don’t you mean? You seem to be the only one giving me grief about this anymore, tell me, why do you think he’s dangerous? Zevran is a tool we can use, he has information and he’s good in a fight. I don’t know about you but have you seen who we have? There’s six of us Alistair,  _ six of us _ . We need every fighter we can get if we’re to get support for these ancient treaties that I’m sure no one cares about anymore.”

He isn’t lying. They do need every fighter they can since Ellanis is sure they’ll not just be waltzing up to the royal family of Orzammar to a warm welcome and immediate support. But he isn’t. He isn’t really telling Alistair the full truth either. Worrying at the inside of his lip Ellanis wonders if he himself really knows why he let Zevran live or why he accepted him into their little fold. 

Andraste guide him, Ellanis catches himself looking from Alistair to Zevran, sunlight catching in his hair and bouncing off his hands as he talks animatedly with, or maybe at, Sten in the front. Ellanis knows why but he brushes the knowledge off as nonsense. And that really isn’t lying either is it?

“Look, you believe in giving people second chances yes? Duncan gave us both a new opportunity and I won’t tarnish that by not doing the same for others.” It’s a low blow to use Duncan like that against Alistair but Ellanis wants the subject dropped. He doesn’t want to think about it, or examine his thoughts, or do anything except accept it as the way it is now. 

The missed beat in Alistair’s step is all Ellanis has to see. Watching his eyes fall down to the ground and as the frown completely takes over his face… Ellanis’ stomach sinks into his toes with the weight of dishonest stones, not quite shame but hot and dirty all the same. The next press of his cane into the ground stamps the dry dirt into a dust cloud. By the Void Ellanis just wants to go home.

Back where things are normal, where he can live quietly in peace. Where no one looks for him to make decisions, where he can disappear entirely if he wants, where he’s free to think and to feel and to, to…

Back where things are dangerous, where he can live cowering in shadows. Where people turn a blind eye to the cripple apostate, where he closes his curtains on rainy spring days, where he’s free to hide and to fear and to run away.

He's living on stolen time - though he isn't the thief. Ellanis let down a ghost once and he doesn't plan on doing it again, the coward's way out isn't available for him now.

It isn’t Alistair’s fault Ellanis keeps his emotions on a tight leash and it isn’t his business to know why he doesn’t care about Zevran’s presence among them. His silence rings through Ellanis’ ears but Ellanis strangles the sympathy trying to worm its way out of his chest. It’s never helped him before and it won’t help now. Ellanis refuses to let it weaken him, so what if he didn’t want this path? He’s walking now and he’ll be damned if he doesn’t reach whatever destination Andraste’s set before him. 

But trapped inside his chest that worm eats at him. Ellanis falls back behind the main group slightly nearly the whole way through Orzammar, thoughts consuming him entirely. Inside the city, they split in half to cover more ground. Leliana and Alistair take off towards the Commons in search of supplies and an inn and Morrigan goes off in search of something called the Shaperate. Sten and Zevran remain with Ellanis as he heads directly for the royal palace -if there’s anyone here who can honor the treaties in this turmoil it’ll be the royal family. Except, of course, it isn’t that simple. Nonsense about succession ripples through his awareness thought Ellanis doesn’t care really about dwarven politics, what he’s here to do is to gain allies and if he has to play fetch for some noble, well, it wouldn’t be the first time. Doesn’t mean he likes it. 

Orzammar is beautiful. In a precarious sort of way, the thrum of violence tinges the air and Ellanis itches for a pencil and parchment.  Details of people and politics slide away in favor of the slow churn of lava, for the glow of lyrium infused lights, and the sounds of a bustling city ripe with conflict. And for all its beauty Orzammar hides ugly truths. Just like any city. 

Both wear off quickly and Ellanis grounds himself enough to listen, really listen. Not so much to the hot air of the nobles and their lackeys, those words are too fickle for Ellanis to put any stock in them, no he listens to the gossip in the streets. The blacksmith talking with a nug herder about the regulations Harrowmont is wanting to place on trade and the restrictions of their business. A group of women by a fountain bemoaning the loss of tradition in Bhelen and how he’s forsaken the Stone in his dealings with surfacers. 

How Harrowmont is favored in the Diamond Quarter but Bhelen is popular in the Commons and how no word of politics are spoken in Dust Town. Or at least none outside of the Carta’s. Only light from lava reaches the forsaken homes and haggard beggars here in Dust Town, casting harsh shadows on each gaunt face. One Ellanis finds almost familiar, a man curled nearly entirely into himself huddled against the corner of a ramshackle house. It’s almost like -

_ A rainy day in the alienage isn’t anything new. With the walls, the sun barely reaches them and rainwater is cleaner than the wells anyway. In his room, Ellanis sets up his easel, old wood creaking before he even so much as places a canvas on it. But it’s what he has and he makes do.  _

_ Glancing out the window Ellanis bites his lip, he’d thought to paint a portrait today -one with gold and red and whites- but the grey of the sky grips his hand and directs his eyes out towards the street. Dirt turns to mud around the vhenadahl in the shape of footprints thought by now most are inside to escape the rain. Most, but not all.  _

_ Huddled in a corner a man tries in vain to keep the rain off him with a thin blanket. Hands over his head, fabric obscuring his face. Either from cold or from holding the blanket over himself for too long the man shakes violently under his makeshift roof. Ellanis watches from his room, dry and relatively warm. It doesn’t take him long to decide to paint the portrait later.  _

_ By the time the rain has stopped Ellanis is nearly done. Blues and purple shadows and a dark grey sky. Mud on the painted figure’s exposed sole. Featureless face upturned towards the sky one drop of rain brighter than the rest falls from the elf’s pointed ear. The whole scene is blurry, indistinct, anonymous. Incomplete.  _

_ Ellanis puts down his brush. Paint leaking into the water and swirling about the cup so stained Ellanis can’t even remember what color it was originally. He does remember it being his mother’s first.  _

_ A knock at his door shakes him from his thoughts before they get a chance to go anywhere. And he doesn’t get to say anything before a colorless face framed by white hair is peeking inside. Mismatched eyes laugh at him, “I thought I’d find you here.”  _

_ “As if you’d find me anywhere else.” Ellanis snorts, shaking the paintbrush in the water to clean it. He only half glances at his friend entering his room, not a single drop of water on them. “Staying dry?”  _

_ They laugh, rebellion in the sound. “I spent far too long on this embroidery to get it wet.” Moving through Ellanis’ room with familiar ease they flop on top of his bed and watch him finish cleaning up his supplies. “What in Andraste’s name could you have painted on a day like this?”  _

_ “You have eyes why don’t you use them.” Ellanis smiles with a shake of his head, “I swear you don’t even try to be observant.”  _

_ “I observe more than you think.” Upside down their face is level with Ellanis hip and they reach out to tug at his tunic. “Like I know I passed a beggar by the vhenadahl this morning and I’m fairly sure I’m looking at him again now, except this time he looks a bit more familiar.”  _

_ Ellanis frowns with his back to them. He can’t be that obvious… Could he? Oh, Andraste be his light he needs to be able to sell this one. But looking at it now Ellanis bites back a grimace, the rain and the shadows and the pointed ear, the desperate kind of sorrow in the hunch of the faceless elf’s shoulders is too real for him to make money from it.  _

_ Sighing he knows he’ll have to make another. Dock the ears and give them a light in the clouds above. A single thread of gold amidst the grey. Wasted paint and canvas he can’t afford.  _

_ “Don’t worry though, I warmed him up. He’s got a thicker blanket and a sovereign to his name so maybe he won’t be in that corner again next time.” Their tone is flippant but Ellanis turns sharply towards them.  _

_ Takes a pause before he asks, a forced casualness in his words, “And how did you do that?”  _

_ Sharp smile taking up their face to match the smugness in their voice, “There weren’t any templars around, I checked. Besides it’s only a simple warming spell, it could have been a rune. The blanket though I did have to go find thank Andraste I had a spare for clients.”  _

_ “You’re taking too many risks Noure.” Maker his heart is beating in his throat just thinking about it, using magic on the streets. Rain or no if they’d been caught…  _

_ Noure shrugs, “I couldn’t just not do anything about it Ellanis, what am I supposed to do just walk on by? You and I both know that’s not going to happen.” Gold and red eyes meet his and Ellanis knows Noure can see through him in an instant. Their gaze softens, turns from youthful defiance into something gentle but no less passionate.  _

_ “Hey, you think too much. I’m fine no one saw me, or the man for that matter. Nothing’s going to happen except he won’t turn up at my house with a cough I can’t fix. He shouldn’t have had to be out in the rain anyways and now he won’t have to again.” Reassuring and quiet Noure pats the sliver of bed beside them and Ellanis rolls the tension from his shoulders.  _

_ ‘Dangerous’ whispers a voice in his head but Noure’s bright eyes are on his and the smile they give him is warmer than any sunlight. Banishes the fear and the tightness holding his heart captive in his chest with the same ease they put it there.  _

_ “Scoot over.” Ellanis lands next to Noure gracelessly and thinks only of a portrait he knows he’ll never paint. _

Ellanis shudders. Forces the memory from his vision to look at the real man before him here and now to find he looks nothing like the elf from that day. This man’s skin is ashen and his pale hair hangs from his head in greasy strings, he doesn’t look up at Ellanis as he walks past. Ellanis grits his teeth and tears his eyes from the man, this isn’t his fight. 

The dying beggar, the broken crone, the dead-eyed youths watching them all from the corners, none of them are Ellanis’ fight. But damn if it isn’t close enough. From the beginning, Ellanis was taught to heal and this feels like ignoring an open wound. 

A mother cradles a child to her chest, one new enough its cries are still raw and shrill. Both of them are too quiet their voices too ragged to carry far through the slum. The noise grates on Ellanis’ ears and they twitch irritably, this is ridiculous. Ripping a scab off never helps but Ellanis is itching and unable to bring himself to care. 

It takes him less than a quarter of an hour to hear all of the woman’s story. The details of castes and the lack of them is a bit lost on him as the woman explains though Ellanis understands enough. A wayward romance, traditions between them and their future, and the worst outcome the mother could have expected. Losing her love, her family, and her future all in the same moment. It’s too close to home for Ellanis, he can’t just not do anything. 

“I’ll talk with your father, see what I can do. I can’t make any promises but. I will try.” He doesn’t even think about it before he agrees to help her. And he doesn’t miss Sten’s disapproving huff either. 

The woman’s eyes are wide and wet with tears she can’t afford to shed, “ _ Thank you. _ ” 

Ellanis nods because he doesn’t know what else to say. Turning on his heel Ellanis catches Zevran and Sten watching him and he raises an eyebrow but makes a shooing motion with his free hand, “We should head back for the night, I think it’s night anyway before we do anything else.” 

“Perhaps we should have stopped before we came here.” Sten falls in step beside Ellanis not looking at him. “Why did you agree to help that woman? Did you not berate Alistair for wasting time and resources before, what will you gain from that woman?” 

Ellanis narrows his eyes slightly at the disdain in Sten’s voice, “Talking to one man isn’t too difficult a task Sten I don’t believe it will waste much time if any.” 

“You didn’t answer my question, even if it isn’t a waste if you do not gain anything the action lacks meaning.” It almost sounds like Sten is explaining to a child how the world works. Like he can't believe Ellanis is serious or that he's missing some point Sten can see clearly. 

“Do you really think that? Fine, let me answer this way then if you insist. I won’t get anything from this Sten, that woman has nothing left not even her name there isn’t anything she could offer me for doing this, but I’m going to do it anyway. Why? Because I can. There is the meaning you are looking for, the one I gave to it by saying ‘yes I can help’ to someone who needed it.” 

Heat blooms and ebbs in Ellanis’ stomach to match his words and the pulse throbbing in his temple. Defensiveness crouches in his tone and Ellanis knows it and yet he keeps going. “It is in my power to do something for this woman when, apparently, no one else is willing to even try. So what if nothing comes of it hm? Maybe her father won’t listen to me, maybe she can’t go back to her old life and she has to live with the outcomes given to her. I don’t know Sten, but I’m at least going to try in the hopes that maybe her father is willing to say yes and Dust Town will have one fewer mouth it can’t feed.”

Sten hums in response and Ellanis grips his cane harshly. He needs air, it’s the only explanation. Wound too tight with nowhere to let off steam Ellanis bites at his bottom lip with a chest full of roiling currents. Everything is too hot, too loud even though the only noise is coming from his breathing and Sten’s thoughts. 

“If it doesn’t matter one way or the other then do as you please. You are the one calling the shots no? Do it or don’t.” Zevran’s voice cuts through the fog of Ellanis’ over thinking easily as a knife through smoke.

Ellanis shifts his gaze from Sten to Zevran and finds he’s already being watched. Zevran shrugs, half-lidded eyes not telling Ellanis anything. Studying each other for a heartbeat both are closed and guarded. 

Sighing Ellanis breaks away first, “You’re right. But it can wait until after we’ve all had some rest.” Just the thought of sleeping in a bed and not the ground tonight has Ellanis’ knee weak and his eyelids heavy. One night of good sleep should help keep his thoughts from running away on their own. Ellanis has more control than this and outbursts are not acceptable.

It doesn’t matter if he should or shouldn’t be in charge, he  _ is _ . Ellanis picks up his pace, shoves down the voice in his head telling him not to take risks, and doesn’t look back leaving Dust Town. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> disclaimer - ellanis doesn't really like alistair so far which is why he thinks of him in the way he does, but that doesn't reflect my own thoughts on alistair lol


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> someone's cheeky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> cw for detailed panic attack description. it's blocked off by _ if you'd like to avoid reading it

Somehow Ellanis wasn’t expecting there to be runes used in Orzammar and especially not so extensively. The air inside Tapster’s Tavern hummed with their ambient energy, settling in Ellanis’ teeth and down his spine. For all they couldn’t cast magic dwarves sure knew how to apply its principles and they didn’t have a shortage of lyrium to limit their creativity. It was odd, Ellanis decided, odd to have so much magic surrounding him without any sort of unease upturning his stomach.

Even inside his room there were several -one a pale icy blue inlaid in a pitcher set on a washbasin, another pulsing a dull red on a thin slab of lilac soapstone between the grey bed sheets, a third glowing dark and inky inside a wide and shallow bowl next to a small sheaf of parchment on the desk. Ellanis had to touch all of them. They did exactly as he expected them to do, the first produced water, the second warmed the stone and his sheets, and the third produced ink. 

Marvelous, beautiful. The delicate workmanship of the lyrium holds Ellanis captive, standing over the desk with his pinky swirling the conjured ink. He could see the faint glow of the rune even below the thick shine, black outlined on black. The impression of energy there on his eyelids when he blinked. 

He wonders if they could buy some of these before they leave tomorrow morning for the Deep Roads. A constant source of fresh water that doesn’t weigh them down or waste his or Morrigan’s mana would come in handy. But they’re low on money after buying only basic supplies. Ellanis sighs, they’re probably expensive even if not rare down here. 

The only rune he’s ever seen before was one only used when absolutely necessary. It belonged to his mentor, red hot and carved on a thin rod with a fine tip, and she would drag it along the edges of the gravest wounds to seal them with a sizzle of burning flesh. There’s no telling where it is now, it was lost nearly a decade ago. 

But these are smaller, more practical. Easy everyday uses and Ellanis is lost in thought with the possibilities of these runes. How many lives could be changed if they were available on the surface? 

Three quicks raps on Ellanis' door startle him from his examination of the runes. Clearing his throat he calls out an "It's unlocked" at whoever is on the other side. It slides open smoothly, stone perfectly fitted against stone, revealing Zevran. Half-grin on his face exposing a keen canine to the lantern light. 

He walks in and shuts the door partially behind him. "You know, it's been not quite a fortnight since you let me join your little party and I have yet to see anything but a scowl on your face." Zevran doesn't step closer, just leans against the wall by the door. Relaxing his posture with a cant of his hips to the side. 

Quickly Ellanis flicks his eyes up away from Zevran’s hips,  _ Andraste _ . 

Zevran’s grin widens just enough to let Ellanis know he noticed. Ellanis doesn't like it, this performance. He isn't stupid, he can see the tension in Zevran's shoulders hasn't dropped and neither has the guarded look in his eyes. Frowning Ellanis turns to better face him, apathy dripping from his tongue "And? I didn't realize my face was any of your business." 

"Merely an observation, bello, since I am not the only one to have made it." The hook of Zevran's smile catches Ellanis' breath, the antivan word he’s heard every so often from Zevran does the same, even as they both grate on his nerves.  "Alistair is right, you haven't reacted one way or the other about anything I've seen. Or, that was until this afternoon, when for some reason you decided to pledge your help to the casteless dwarven woman." 

He shifts, stepping away from the wall and towards Ellanis all sharp smile and flashing eyes. "So, my question is why?"

“That’s more than one question.” Deflecting, shaking the ink from his pinky onto the parchment just for an excuse to take his eyes from Zevran. “What are you really asking me?”

Zevran doesn’t falter, doesn’t even so much as click his tongue. “I’m asking about you. You must care about some things yes? Why the woman, why not the man before her?” 

The ink sinks into the parchment and spreads, tendrils of black curling and twisting outwards without a goal beyond expansion. Seeking but never finding. Ellanis doesn’t look up yet, he can see Zevran’s shoes in the corner of his vision and knows he’s still stalking forward. The gap of silence stretches and Ellanis doesn’t know how to fill it. 

By all rights, it should be an easy question. A simple answer of any meaningless drivel could suffice here -she has a child, he was already dead. But it isn’t either and they both know it. Nothing about this has been simple. 

Ellanis sighs, “If I could give you an answer I might. I don’t know why. I’ve seen a great many things I wish I hadn’t and maybe that’s why. She just happened to be the last one I could stomach.” 

Easy enough. What is the truth but a lie of unknown omission?

Zevran’s hand on the desk startles Ellanis enough to raise his gaze. When did he get so close? Zevran’s face is expressive for all it doesn’t give away, his eyes warm in the lantern light as they capture Ellanis’. Dangerous. 

“If you say so.” Zevran shrugs lazily, a smirk on his face and eyes not leaving Ellanis’ own. “You don’t have any reason to trust me, perhaps I should not have expected you to answer.” He laughs, “Actually, I didn’t even expect you to answer the door. But you even let me inside your quarters, alone, at night. I should have taken that as my answer.” 

“Don’t worry about my self-preservation, Zevran, I’m always in control.” Ellanis can smell him he’s so close, blade oil and leather. Subtle and overwhelming him, dizzying Ellanis from proximity. 

Distracting him.

“Are you in control, bello?” The gentle slide of metal on leather is almost lost in the harshness of Ellanis’ exhale. But the coolness of the blade against his neck is not. Zevran’s eyes haven’t changed, they’re still warm and relaxed and golden. Deceptive. 

Voice like velvet, grip like steel. Pressure only. For a heartbeat, time stands still, metal on skin electric. Zevran’s hand is perfectly still without a shiver of indecision.  _ The gall. _

Without hesitation, Ellanis grasps Zevran with his magic. Allows the creeping tendrils of his mana to invade the eddies of Zevran, seizing his arm with a memory of old wounds and locks it in place. The corners of Zevran’s mouth flick upward for a fraction of a second, eyes widening a measure. It lights Ellanis on fire. 

“I told you. Always.” Ellanis plucks the dagger from Zevran’s stiff fingers setting it down on the ink-stained parchment. “Don’t doubt or underestimate me again.” Under his skin, his blood boils, but not with rage. It’s a prickling racing across him, an itch he can’t scratch. Unfamiliar and unnameable.

He releases his hold on Zevran, magic dissipating back into nothing, and gestures toward the door, “Now get out. It’s late and I have preparations to make. I’m sure you can find someone else to play with.” 

Zevran’s laugh is low enough it resonates in Ellanis’ chest more than his ears. “But who else would make the game so fun?” But Zevran steps back, hands together in front of him, rubbing circles in the palm of his now empty hand with his thumb. Leaving with nothing beyond those words and a glance thrown over his shoulder crossing the threshold. 

Heat crawls under his skin. Irritates him. Ellanis balls it up in the center of his chest, burning and swirling and eating away at the control Ellanis told Zevran he always has. Deep breath in, hold. Air in his lungs catching fire to match the rest of him. Exhales. All of it, every molten flame Ellanis breathes out in a huff, letting it fall away from him. 

Not stopping until his chest aches with emptiness. By the void what happened? Why had Ellanis allowed any of  _ that _ to have happened? Where had the heat come from and Andraste why had it gripped him with such force?

Ellanis closes his eyes. He  _ is  _ in control, one man is nowhere near enough to shake that from him. This is just, a fluke. Yes, a fluke, he’s on edge and jittery and this is just a fluke. It won’t happen again, Ellanis will make sure of it. 

Even if he has to choke the small voice whispering in the back of his head to do so.

_

_ As if to spite him Ellanis’ nightmares are frozen. Icy winds tearing him apart with their strength, whipping about him in merciless laughter A great howling precipice, endless darkness waiting to swallow him whole the moment he falls. Teetering on the edge. Nothing stretches into eternity on all sides around him, a single thread under his feet.  _

_ He will fall.  _

_ Maybe not now, maybe not for a while, maybe not until his heart gives out and he enters the void around him already separated from himself. But he will fall and he will enter it. _

_ The edge beckons, cackles. Whispers and croons. A voice he’s come to find familiar, a blade’s edge on his skin. Nothing he can do to stop it here. It glides along his neck like a caress, like a lover, spilling cold teardrops of crimson crystal to shatter in the gusts.  _

_ Ice on his eyelashes, fingertips black and cracked and immobile, Ellanis’ teeth are little more than shards digging into his cheeks with broken and jagged edges slicing at dead flesh. But he continues.  _

_ Has to continue, there is an end and he will come to see it. There has to be something -a new bud, a single fire, a sunrise. It doesn’t matter so long as it exists. This hollow cavern cannot be everything Ellanis refuses to even consider it.  _

_ But the thread carving the frigid flesh from his foot grows thinner with every step he takes. Nothing but a strand of hair and empty air and for a brief second Ellanis is suspended, floating. Flying.  _

_ And then he is falling. And he is laughing in time with the screams surrounding him. _

It leaves him gasping, jerking awake into a different kind of darkness. One not bound on either side by teeth. His sheets are warm on his clammy skin soaked through with sweat where they cling to him. Heart racing, beating against his chest hard enough to bruise. To bleed. Ellanis curls around himself, ragged breathing muffled by his knees. Heat in tracks on his cheeks.

Ellanis bites his tongue hard enough to draw blood to contain the scream building in his chest. What is he? A scared child? Weak in the face of some nightmare come to stalk his dreams? No, not here, not now. 

The vastness of the darkness fills his blurred vision, clamps its boney hands around his lungs and squeezes. Ellanis chokes on the dampness in the back of his throat. Presses his eyes closed only to open them wide to try and tell the difference. But it’s all just darkness, darkness on every side -outside and inside and his eyes are open but it’s all dark. No light. No light, there’s _no light_ and its closing around him. 

Crushing him.

No air in his lungs for all he tries to suck it in, his chest hurts with the force of his breaths but they’re doing him no good. There is nothing around him and at the same time there is everything around him in the dark just waiting for him. He can’t see. Can’t breathe, can’t move. Can only feel the weight of the stone around him, above him, below him. 

Trapped. He’s trapped, he’s trapped,  _ he’s trapped. He's _  -

Ellanis shudders, balls up as closely as he can. Sobs without a sound into the tiny space between his thighs and his chest. His bad leg is throbbing in time with his rapid heart, and he’s still trapped. Nowhere to go, nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. It’s all collapsing down around him and Ellanis is going to be caught.

Whispers in broken cadence, a prayer in the darkness held like a dying ember. “ _ O’ Maker, hear my cry: Guide me through the blackest nights. Steel my heart against the temptations of the wicked. Make me to rest in the warmest places. _ ” Chants. Pleads with the last of the air in his lungs, the last strength in his chest. 

It doesn’t make it easier, but it makes the darkness lighter. Ellanis repeats the verse listlessly the words falling from his numb tongue without pause or thought. Slowly, so slowly it feels like the ice never left him, it’s waiting, just waiting for him to slip and fall and crumble under the weight again and again and again and -

Ellanis breathes. Tries to grab for the control he’s honed over his lifetime and finds it out of his reach. Salt on his lips, prayer on his tongue. Ellanis makes himself as small as he can and lets exhaustion eat away at his bones until the darkness is chased away by false morning light.

_

Exhausted from his night Ellanis heads out early, desperate to get away from the cramped room of the inn. It’s early, early enough he’s the only one awake in the dulled light. Good. Ellanis may have taken the time to meticulously check himself over this morning, not a hair out of place nor a wrinkle to his clothes, but he’s sure the bags under his eyes haven’t gone away. Not much he can do about those. 

He huffs through his nose, it’s fine. No one’s gonna notice and if they do so what? First things first, there’s no time to waste dawdling. Before anyone can find him Ellanis searches for the woman’s, Zerlinda, if he caught her name correctly, father. It doesn’t take him as long as he thought it would, with him being inside the common room of Tapsters and all. 

“What are you looking at stranger?” The dwarf looks Ellanis up and down as he approaches, narrowing his eyes. 

Ellanis balks, “You are Ordel, right? Sorry if I mistook you for someone else, I’m looking for him with a message.”

“I could be, what kind of message are you passing on?” 

“I met a woman, named Zerlinda, in Dust Town saying she was your daughter. She told me you kicked her out for having a son, that she’s afraid of what her future holds.” Cringing Ellanis fiddles with the grip of his cane, “I came to ask on her behalf if you would be willing to take her back. I’m a healer and she’s ill, I doubt the conditions of Dust Town will do anything to help her recover but if she’s seen to quickly her cough won’t be serious.” 

Ordel scoffs, “I have no daughter, and if I did she knows what she has to do to come home.”

The curl of his lip and the glint in his eye sickens Ellanis, “So you would rather her die on the streets?”

“I didn’t want to cast her out, she decided to keep that little cur. I’m doing what is best for my family, she’d be better off without it but she won’t listen.” Ordel’s expression sours, his hands balling up at his sides. “Her mistake would bring down us all.”

“Her mistake is a child, how can abandoning your daughter and grandchild be what’s best for your family?” Disgust rolls in Ellanis’ stomach and curdles. How could this man even think about doing such a thing, let alone act on it?

Ordel sneers, “Accepting that child would bring scandal and ruin on our family!”

“So you value your honor above your family?” Ellanis counters, revulsion clear in the twist of his mouth, “You would let your family rot to keep it safe?” 

“It isn’t easy stranger.” Ellanis can see a sliver of grief in the man’s expression, “It’s what we thought best.”

“Do you still think it best?” If he can just get Ordel to see, to understand what he already knows. Ellanis holds his breath watching the myriad of misery and anxiety fight across Ordel’s face. 

Before it settles into resignation. “Look, just tell her… We never meant to hurt her, just. Just tell her to come home, her mother and I are waiting for her.” 

Nodding Ellanis replies simply, “I will.” He doesn't wait to see Ordel's fist hit the table. Instead, Ellanis quickly takes his leave of Ordel and the inn, setting out into Orzammar without any goal beyond wandering. It’s a good a way as any to kill time before the others are awake. 

Ellanis guesses he has probably a little under two hours to whittle away, the lanterns are dimmed to a ruddy orange on the streets and he’s relatively alone. One of the perks of not sleeping is getting to see the world before anyone else. If he tells himself he prefers it this way eventually he'll believe it.

Walking without a goal Ellanis makes his way down the Commons. The only other person in sight a young woman observing the lava flow. She looks up at the sound of Ellanis’ approach, the clack of his cane hard to miss, and smiles warmly at him. Too warmly for how early it is but Ellanis raises a hand in greeting. 

“Good morning.”

“Good morning yourself,” she waves back. “You don’t look like you’re from around here.” 

Ellanis laughs, “You could say that. I’m from Denerim, though I doubt I’ll be returning any time soon.” 

“Oh! Wonderful, or well, wonderful about being from the surface. Not so much the not returning home thing.” The dwarven lady’s voice is bubbly, like her smile, and she beckons Ellanis over by the retaining wall. 

He follows with a hesitant smile of his own, “I thought dwarves didn’t care for the surface.” 

“Most don’t. But I’ve been trying forever to find someone who does. You wouldn’t happen to know of something called the Circle?” Cheery words and happy eyes.

Words that spill a bucket of ice water down Ellanis’ spine. He recoils instantly, wary and on edge with just a sentence. “I do. But I do not care to discuss it.” 

“Oh.” She deflates and hangs her head, “I’ve been trying to contact them for ages. I want to know if they’d accept me for study. Every missive I’ve sent on caravans has gone unanswered.”

“You…” What? Ellanis can’t have heard her right, “You  _ want _ to go study at the Circle? But you can’t do magic, or leave Orzammar can you? What - why would you go?”

Perking up the dwarf waves her hands about in front of her animatedly. “Because I want to learn about magic! I know I can’t do it, no dwarf can, but that doesn’t mean I can’t study it. Plus it could be a valuable exchange. I learn and share knowledge of one of the great natural forces on the surface and the Circle gains access to our knowledge of lyrium smithing.

“It’s good for everyone. Magic is so  _ interesting _ , and the Shaperate doesn’t have many books or histories about it, unless they’re about lyrium. Or trading. But that doesn’t matter. Oh, I’m Dagna by the way, I don’t think I introduced myself.” 

“Ellanis.” Her speech has his eyebrows to his hairline, and for the sense it makes he can’t stop his head from spinning. “You can learn without the Circle, it isn’t a safe place.” 

“It’s the only place!” Dagna’s eyes are wide, her shoulders relaxed. Bewilderment in her exclamation she laughs. “The Circle isn’t dangerous, it’s a place for education.” 

Ellanis shakes his head, “The Circle is the most dangerous place on the surface. If you truly wish to go there you need to understand that. It isn’t a school, it’s a prison.” 

“What? I’ve never heard anything like that.” A crease appears in her brow though and Ellanis hopes she might at least be thinking about it.

“Trust me. I’ve spent my life avoiding it, I’m an apostate.” Ah, now why did he say that. Ellanis shakes his head, “Don’t. Please don’t ask. If you want I’ll get your request to the Circle but think about what it could do to you first. If you decide you still want to go I’ll see what I can do to get you there.” 

Dagna brightens, “Oh would you? Thank you! I… I’ll think about what you’ve said before I go.” 

“That’s all I can ask.” Ellanis shrugs, unease settling in his stomach. It isn’t his job to keep people from throwing themselves into the fire. What she does isn’t up to him, but it… It doesn’t feel right to just let her go without warning her. 

He continues to wander around Orzammar for a while, finding a merchant he hadn’t seen the day before. Stationary and ink, loose leaf parchment and scrolls and a few sketchbooks. Ellanis only hesitates for a moment before buying a sketchbook and a handful of charcoal pencils. Something to keep himself occupied with at night, and he’s heard tales of the wonders of the deep roads. 

Ellanis only turns back to the inn when his leg starts to ache. In his rush to leave, to escape the confines of that room he hadn’t stretched properly and he’s already paying for it. Walking into Tapsters he finds most everyone else already around. Alistair greets him with a wave and a nod, they’re ready. 

It’s going to be a long time without the sun. 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> thinking and talking and thinking

Of course, they’re waylaid before they even make it out of Orzammar. 

“Stranger, have you seen a Grey Warden hereabouts?” A dwarf reeking of stale ale and sweat stumbles in the road ahead of them, warily looking their group over. “I’ve been privy to the rumor that he… or was it she - you understand this was many mugs ago- was searching for Branka on Bhelen’s own sodding command.” 

His watery bloodshot eyes can’t focus on any of them for long and Ellanis crinkles his nose in distaste. Skin prickling in discomfort at the word she but he tries to bury it. What in Andraste’s name is this man doing? Many mugs ago indeed, Ellanis doubts this man was sober before those many mugs. Still, if he knows about where they’re headed it can’t hurt more than breathing in the lingering stench to ask. “You’re looking at him. What do you know of Branka and why are you looking for me?” 

“You?” The man guffaws, slapping his hand on his belly. “If you’re the best they’ve got standards must have fallen way down. But. I’spose that would account for an elf being down here.” Lisping with drink and it isn’t even time for morning tea for most people. There aren’t many types who can raise Ellanis’ hackles immediately but Maker this man does.

The man reminds him of the worst wretches in the alienage. Those who couldn't make coin, or drank it away entirely, and lived in filth even compared to the rest of them. Not always through their own faults either some merely unlucky but others festered in their misfortune, growing ugly scowls to spit ugly words. And this man before Ellanis doesn't seem to be simply unlucky.

Already Ellanis wants to be rid of him. “Yes, you might suppose so. Why, exactly, did you stop us?” Eye on the verge of twitching, Ellanis pierces the drunkard with a withering glance down his nose. Hoping to get him to shut up and move on honestly. 

“Could you do me a favor?” Not noticing, or perhaps ignoring, how Ellanis’ stare falls from irritation to disbelief the dwarf continues. “Name’s Oghren, and if you’ve ever heard of me before, it’s probably all been about how I piss ale and kill little boys who look at me wrong.” 

Ah. Charming. 

“And that’s mostly true, but the part they never say is how I’m the only one still trying to save our only Paragon. And if you’re looking for Branka, I’m the only one who knows what she was looking for. Which might be pretty sodding helpful in finding her.” Oghren’s whole body sways in time with his words, leaning in one direction and then the next as he waves an arm about. 

Ellanis raises an eyebrow, “Just how do you know what she’s after. I was told she took her entire house down into the Deep Roads with her. And even if you did know why haven’t you gone yourself, or told someone else?” 

“Believe me, I have. But where she was going, it’s a lost thaig. No one’s seen it in centuries. I searched as far as I could, but… It would take teams working weeks on end to cover enough ground to hope to find it.” He scratches his head, shooting Ellanis a narrow-eyed grimace. “Which, I assume, is just what Bhelen’s men have done. And they shared that they found with you. 

“But they haven’t found Branka herself, and that means whatever they’ve got, it’s not enough if you don’t know what she was looking for.” Ohhh Ellanis knows where this is going and he doesn’t like it. No, no, please. Please, Andraste don’t let him ask it, please. “If we pool our knowledge, we stand a chance of finding Branka. Otherwise, good sodding luck.”

The Maker truly has turned his back on them. 

Alistair shuffles behind Ellanis, “You’d search the Deep Roads for her? You know how dangerous it is right and you don’t, uh, look prepared for an expedition.” Oh, thank Andraste he isn’t the only one with reservations. 

“He doesn’t smell like it either,” Zevran mutters and Ellanis twists his mouth to keep from agreeing with a smirk. He won't be falling for  _his_ words again.

Oghren laughs, buts it's darker and uglier than before. “You’re not planning an expedition and I’ve been petitioning to go down there for nearly two years. I mean to get her back.” He shifts on his feet, “I’m a bloody warrior, not that anyone in the Assembly gives a nug’s ass, I’m not going to watch someone else finish something I started.” 

Somewhere in the back of his head, a snide little voice is telling Ellanis he had been thinking of looking for one or two more fighters to join them just in case. Ellanis tells the voice to shut up. A drunken warrior is definitely not who he’d had in mind if anything Oghren would be more of a liability than an asset. 

Worrying at his lip Ellanis does some quick math in his head, comparing the size of their ration stock to the size of the dwarf in front of them. They didn’t pack alcohol but, Ellanis sighs, they should have enough food to feed one more warrior. 

“Why are you so set on finding Branka, is it because she’s a Paragon?” If he just wants glory Ellanis could tell the man to just get lost. He isn’t in the mood for anyone to play around with him. 

Oghren squints at him, “Why? We were sodding married until she left me and took our whole house into the Deep Roads on her mad quest for the Anvil. It was a stupid move. If I’d been with her, she’d have made it back years ago. But I forgive her.”

Blinking in surprise Ellanis thinks Branka made the right choice. He can’t believe Oghren, he forgives  _ her _ ? But, nope, Oghren’s problems aren’t Ellanis’. Except, he’s going to want to go with them, and Ellanis can’t think fast enough to come up with a good enough excuse to refuse him. 

“Alright, fine, you can come with us. I hope you came down here prepared because we won’t be turning back or waiting for you to pack.” Ellanis has to raise his voice over the sound of everyone else groaning, not that he disagrees. 

Sighing himself, Ellanis watches the grin spread across Oghren’s face. “You can bet your arse I did, time is of the essence. If we’re going to catch up with Branka I suggest we get moving.” 

Ellanis purses his lips but doesn’t let the ‘We were moving’ slip past them. There’s a headache building behind his eyes and he swears the stench is beginning to make his eyes water, but it’s too late. They’re making their way down to the entrance with an extra.

Even a single step into the cavernous entrance to the Deep Roads has Ellanis instantly on edge. It may be the lack of sleep making him paranoid and he tells himself he’s imagining the breath like chill wind sweeping around his legs and raising the hair on the back of his neck. But he isn’t the only one shivering.

Nothing comes of it. The first hours drag, they travel an endless hallway lined by canals of magma with nothing to break the monotony but differently patterned cave-ins. Dark stone and red glow, shadows in odd places. Narrow and unsettling. Ellanis reminds himself to breathe slowly, not wanting a repeat of last night. They're wandering more than anything else, the map they have is good only for so long but the general direction is enough. Zevran and Leliana fill the silence in the front, chatting only slightly forced enthusiasm, though Ellanis can’t make out their words. 

It… It bothers him. 

He’s dangerous. Zevran is still, however much he claims to deny it, under contract to kill them. Ellanis and Alistair especially. The half smile he throws in Leliana’s direction could be as fake as the way he’d smiled at Ellanis last night, right before he’d pulled out a blade. 

But he didn’t use it. And Andraste as his witness Ellanis knows Zevran had the chance, he could have easily slit his throat and snuck out of the inn, out of Orzammar entirely, and the rest of them would have been none the wiser. It would have crippled them, Alistair has no interest in leading and their little band of misfits certainly have no ties to each other beyond Ellanis. 

Zevran had held his blade to Ellanis’ throat and he hadn’t done more than let the blade caress his skin. He hadn’t even left a mark. Why. Why? Ellanis can’t take his eyes from Zevran’s back, the breadth of his shoulders. 

It should make him angry. Furious even. It should make him scared. Terrified. But Ellanis is neither of those things or maybe he’s both and something more. It makes him curious, what kind of man would do something so brazen and not even mention it the next morning? 

A brave one? A stupid one? Or one who has no other choice? Ellanis remembers the dead look in Zevran’s eyes the first time they met, remembers the emptiness behind gold. They’d been cold, nothing like the warmth Zevran has now. But maybe that’s fake too and Ellanis is falling for a ploy. A trick played on the unwary, walls lowered only for a blade to slip past and slice skin. 

Ellanis knows not to let his guard down, grew up with walls surrounding him higher than any alienage could hope to reach. Twice in his life, those walls didn’t come high enough to protect him and each time Ellanis built them back a little taller. A little thicker. Because he won’t be vulnerable again, there isn’t anything the Maker can do to him now more painful than seven years of lossed-

No. 

Cutting off his thoughts before they can continue down the one path he’s forbidden himself to think about Ellanis unclenches his grip around his cane. He’d been holding it hard enough for his hand to cramp and he hadn’t even noticed. Tiny needles dig around in his palm and Ellanis sighs, his fault for not paying attention. 

Thankfully, Ellanis’ focus is grabbed by the handful of darkspawn the stumble upon rounding a corner in the roads, a cave now really. He lets his mana crawl out of him to seep into the closest hurlock, the taint in the creature’s blood doing most of his work for him. With all of them, including Oghren who for all his wobbling while walking proves to be a fairly capable warrior, the skirmish is over before it can begin. 

And Ellanis is left with euphoria in his veins and the same thoughts swirling around in his head. 

Why? Ellanis circles back to the same question over and over, sure Zevran can feel the weight of his gaze between his shoulders. Why join them, why ask for protection, why come into his quarters late at night to press a dull dagger against his throat? 

Deception. It must be, who is Zevran trying to fool? Him? Ellanis doesn’t like it. It must be a show, a con, the light in his eyes and the smile on his lips can’t be real. 

There’s another voice, smaller and hesitant, telling him Zevran could be fooling anyone of them. Even himself. 

No, he doesn't like it, Ellanis decides. The animated waving of his hands as he talks, the laugh in his voice, the easy slant of his shoulders. Ellanis doesn't like the way the light catches in his hair as they walk by waterfalls of burning magma or the languid sway of his hips. He strangles the little voice viciously for it, too, is dangerous.

In his trouser pocket Ellanis' fingers fiddle across the hilt of Zevran's dagger. Taken from his hands, a touch Ellanis could still feel lingering under his skin. And maybe, maybe that’s the most dangerous of all. 

Ellanis can’t get Zevran out of his head. Can’t stop thinking about him. Paranoia mixing with curiosity into a bubbling something else. Something new and familiar and decidedly unwanted.

Andraste, the man had held a dagger to his throat and now all Ellanis can do is fantasize about his hands. His shoulders. His hips and his eyes. His-

"You seem distracted as of late" Morrigan's smooth words startle Ellanis out of his head. "'Twould be most unfortunate if you were lost in thought in the middle of a skirmish." The sly raise of her eyebrow over her impish smirk has Ellanis scowling.

But he rips his gaze from Zevran ahead of them anyway.

"I'm not distracted, Morrigan, simply wondering why we've gone for so long without another encounter. It's too quiet." It’s not necessarily a lie, it’s nearly time for them to start setting up camp and the last ambush was just after their midday meal break. 

Morrigan scoffs though more with amusement than disdain. “Indeed. Perhaps speaking of them will draw the darkspawn closer so you may continue your navel-gazing.” 

“I’m offended you would even suggest the possibility.” He should be, at any rate, Ellanis shakes out his free hand by his side, anxious for no reason other than Morrigan is talking to him. Something Ellanis thought himself long since past. 

He has no need for this odd energy, festering like an itch he can’t scratch under his skin. Why is he defensive? Ellanis isn’t the one doing wrong, quite the contrary. He’s uncovering the wrongdoings, the hidden plot. So why is his stomach churning? 

Maker all of this is ridiculous. What are any of them doing here? 

“If it weighs so heavily on your mind ‘twould be best to share the burden.” Rescuing him again. Morrigan shifts, turning to face him for a moment before continuing down the road. “I am, unfamiliar with this sort of business, but I am told it is helpful.” 

The sincerity in her voice throws him for a loop. Ellanis trusts Morrigan, out of all their companions she, like him, wants to be here the least. Nagging doubts aside Ellanis wonders if he can truly call her a friend, if their easy camaraderie is authentic or if she, too, is faking it. All of it.

He isn’t sure he wants to know. 

Ellanis tries to laugh, but it dies somewhere between his lungs and his lips, “Aww Morrigan you do care.” Her huff gives rise to a real, genuine laugh. “Don’t worry I’m. I’m new to this too. There are things I, things I struggle with I guess you could say. I’m not one for sharing my thoughts so don’t let them bother you.” 

“If I could ignore them believe me I would.” Morrigan sniffs, tilting her head away from Ellanis. “You, however, seem intent on ensuring I can do no such thing. It’s difficult to be surprised by darkspawn with two Grey Wardens and yet so far we’ve only had one warning and it was from Alistair. Perhaps if you were not so distracted you would be better equipped to spot the beasts before they spot us.” 

Well, he can’t argue too much there now, can he? Grimacing Ellanis tries anyway and gets nowhere outside of a dry swallow. “I’m concerned about some members of our party. Is that a good enough explanation for you?” A partial admittance is still an opening is it not? 

“Concerned is not the word I would choose. Preoccupied maybe, bewitched, perhaps infatuated.” 

Ellanis bristles caught off guard and disliking it immensely. “Did I ask what word you would choose? I don’t recall allowing you inside my head so try not to define my emotions for me.” He’s probably being too abrupt, too aggressive, but Ellanis doesn’t care. Who gave Morrigan the right? 

“You don’t watch Alistair with such passion, Leliana and I receive no such pensive stares, Sten is not held under unwavering focus. And yet Zevran reaps all of these. Do you care to explain why?” Morrigan doesn’t hold back. Even her tone is final, demanding rather than asking Ellanis to share his concerns. 

Apparently, she gave herself the right. 

“I don’t actually.” Ellanis is under no obligation to, to bare himself before Morrigan’s scrutiny. “My business is my own and I’d rather not have you ask about it.” Palm sweaty against the wood of his cane Ellanis stamps it against the hard stone. Lets the reverberation in the wood soak into his hand and up his arm, grounding him in his outburst. 

Breathing a sigh out of his nose Ellanis calls out to the rest of the group, “This is a decent spot to build camp, we’ll need to set up and tear down quickly. Lingering in one area down here is too risky to do for long.” 

Nodding heads and a couple of affirmative noises are all Ellanis gets in response. Aside from Morrigan’s narrow-eyed glare of course. Ellanis doesn’t care, doesn’t want to care. He didn’t ask for her snooping and he rather doesn’t crave her to continue trying to meddle in his affairs. It’s a mistake to trust, Ellanis should know. 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ellanis is an idiot

It takes two and a half weeks for them to make it to Caridin’s Cross. Plus another week to make it to Ortan Thaig from there. Ellanis spends each one of those days fuming, withdrawn from all of them. Who gave Morrigan the right, the audacity, to glare and skulk when she’s the one who tried to pry into  _ his _ life? For a full week, Ellanis didn’t even look in her direction and a frosty silence divided them. 

Still divides them. 

For however cold Morrigan is Ellanis is itching with heat, it crawls under his skin and settles in his fingers. How  _ dare _ . The long walks give him plenty of time to think, too, and Ellanis fights his thoughts more than he fights Morrigan in arguments he’ll never use. Wrestles with them, balls them up and throws them against the inside of his skull only for them to bounce back and strike him with more force than they had before. 

It’s maddening. Infuriating. The only break comes with the darkspawn and Ellanis thanks Andraste there is no shortage of them. Waves of taint in nearly all directions, reverberating in the stone crouched around them and reflecting off the corruption in Ellanis’ own blood. 

A scream up ahead catches everyone’s attention. 

“Follow that,” Ellanis commands, picking up his own pace to catch up further with the group. 

It’s a guttural scream, low and more forceful than one of pain. A warning. Someone small and hunched in the shadows, disappearing down a cave tunnel. With only another order from Ellanis to continue following it, the gang makes their way to the entrance, the shadow jumping in their way. 

“There’s nothing for you here, it’s mine. I’ve claimed it.” Jagged voice to match his haggard appearance the shadow reveals himself to be a dwarf in rag covered sores. “You’ve come to take my claim! You surfacers are all alike, thieving scoundrels. Well, I found it first. Begone you! You’ll bring the dark ones back you will. They’ll crunch your bones.” 

His head lolls on his shoulders, stuck in an unnatural angle. Unsettling as the milky white and inky black growths dotting his skin. Ellanis chokes down nausea at the sight of him, what happened to this man?

“My claim! Not yours. Crunch your bones!” The dwarf scurries further back into the tunnel, skidding around the puddles littering the uneven ground. 

Ellanis cocks his head in Oghren’s direction, “Wouldn’t happen to have an explanation for him would you?” 

“Not any I like.” Oghren spits, “Looked like a sodding scavenger to me. Rumor has it you can only survive the Deep Roads by eating darkspawn flesh.”

Lovely. “Survive by eating poison now there’s an idea.” Well, it explains those welts and oozing things on his skin at least. “If he’s a ghoul, or turning into one, we’d best go check it out.” 

Nearly an hour and a conversation Ellanis is sure he’ll be seeing again in his nightmares later Ellanis is absolutely chilled to his core. Alistair is too if the blood draining from his face with each new horrifying word Ruck speaks is any indication. Another burden Ellanis hadn’t asked for, another bleaker outcome for his future. 

Branka was here, they're on the right path. Ruck didn't give them much but he did at least give them something other than ice cold realizations.  Leaving the cave behind only reminds Ellanis where they are. How far they still have to go. How little he is and how slim their chances are. It’s impossible! There’s no way short of Andraste herself handing him a miracle they’ll come out of this alive. 

It’s madness.

Rocks mock him, lava gurgles its laughter. Crumbling stone threatens to fall down on him, to collapse, to trap him within the dust and darkspawn and dirt. It keeps Ellanis’ spine straight, his shoulders tense. And it pisses him off. 

Ellanis trips over a rut in the road his cane twisting nearly out of his grasp. “For fuck's sake!” Nearly every head turns back to look at him and Ellanis realized he must have yelled. He forces himself to relax rolling his shoulders and unclenching his aching jaw. “Apologies, we should be keeping a lookout for darkspawn, there’s a clump of them up ahead I think.” 

Gold eyes glance over, flick up and down and Ellanis grits his teeth. _He’s_ the last person Ellanis wants to talk to right now. 

Zevran slows down to walk side by side with Ellanis, “You know, there is a saying in Antiva, ‘ más se consigue lamiendo que mordiendo’, more is achieved with licking than biting.” He stretches his hands over his head while he talks, catching his elbow with a hand and holding it there. Turns so he’s walking nearly sideways to Ellanis, eyebrow quirking in his direction, “I’ve heard you Fereldans have something similar, something about flies and honey. But I find I like ours better.” 

“Perhaps I like being bitten. And why does everyone think I need their advice since I have yet to ask for it.” Ellanis’ lips pull down sharply, steadfastly ignoring Zevran’s eyes. Gaze kept locked on the road so he doesn’t trip again Ellanis wads up the irritation building at the base of his skull before it can grow. He is in control. 

Letting his hands fall back down Zevran faces the road before them once more. “I did not mean to offend, truly. It isn’t good to keep yourself so tense, I could hear your shoulders pop when we last fought.” 

Did they? If they did Ellanis hadn’t noticed, but they are sore. He glances over to Zevran out of the corner of his eye and finds him watching Ellanis in turn. “Why do you care? You’re in a win/win scenario, which you made decidedly clear back in Orzammar.”

Ellanis knows Zevran still thinks about it because Ellanis is. Lantern light and blade oil, glinting steel and held breaths. The way Zevran’s eyes had widened haunts Ellanis in his dreams let alone his waking thoughts. Chases after him and tangles itself in with the rest of the mess. 

“If we don’t make it back your job is finished, Grey Wardens vanquished and all. If we do make it back you’re still protected from the Crows, so long as you stay with us I suppose.” Maybe if he puts enough contempt in his voice Zevran will leave him alone.

“The Crows would not take me back if I delivered them your head on a silver platter. No, bello, I have no options but the ones you give me. I simply… Tested the waters so to speak.” Zevran chuckles, flexing his fingers out in front of him. “Being bitten by a knife is not something you need to worry about here. And I do recall you disarming me.” 

Quickly. Within heartbeats, Ellanis had taken control and sent Zevran on his way and now his dagger weighs down Ellanis’ pocket. 

“What does this have to do with what you’re doing now Zevran?” Ellanis asks slowly, “You’ve done your testing, haven’t you? Why are you bothering me still?” 

Zevran hums but doesn’t answer Ellanis right away. Instead, he keeps stretching, hands behind his back now. Something cracks and Zevran lets out a loud, contented sigh. “If your life depended on staying in the good graces of someone who, for the first few weeks you met him, laughed quietly and uncommonly, smiled rarely, but kept a level head and never let himself relax would you think yourself lucky?

“And say, you did. This man is different than the ones you’ve met before. But something happens. Suddenly this man never smiles, never laughs. Just scowls and frowns and bites at anyone who tries to ask him questions. It’s a problem no? Not even just you with your debt but everyone else too, see, this man is supposed to be in charge.” 

Eyes narrowing Ellanis draws himself up, “Are you saying something about how I’m directing this party Zevran? Because you can just say it, if you’re capable.” Brusque, sharp, Ellanis bristles at the thought. 

It isn’t like he wants to be the one in charge. It isn’t like he asked for this! Ellanis hadn’t planned on walking out of the Arl’s estate alive but he had, he hadn’t planned on being conscripted but he had. And he certainly had not planned on everything else happening in between the last time he saw the alienage and now. If Ellanis could set this shit down and walk away he  _ would _ . But he can’t. 

He can’t so he bears it instead. 

“I am saying perhaps Morrigan is right. More often than she is given credit.” Zevran stops walking, holding his hand up, “I don’t know what happened but she was the only one who could get you to make any sort of expression at all and ever since we left Orzammar all of us are feeling the chill between you two.”

Oh no, no, no. “Morrigan is wrong and I don’t need you sticking your nose in where it does not belong.” Ellanis stops too, swiveling to glare at Zevran properly. “You’re easy to see through Zevran, all of this talk about caring and laughing. You don’t give a damn about it, I know you don’t. You only care about the protection I’m offering you and I only care about getting the void out of here. So shut up, fall in line, and stop pretending.”

With each of his words, Ellanis’ voice hardens, drops until he’s nearly whispering. Ganging up on him, undermining him, stone walls rising above and below and on either side and Ellanis is quaking with something he can’t even name. Zevran’s eyes widen, gold flashing in the red-tinged light, closing off with the last of Ellanis’ vitriol. 

“Think what you want. I rescind my offer, you can keep your scowls if they please you.” Zevran pivots on his heel and stalks off sharply and Ellanis can’t help but notice the tension between his shoulders. 

Chest deflating, the cesspool of roiling rage and dread and pride draining from Ellanis to spill out like tar on the stones. It’s better this way, Ellanis reminds himself, he’s practiced pushing people away before. What’s a handful more? 

He kicks at a loose stone with his cane, nose scrunching into his brow. Morrigan isn’t right. And neither is Zevran. So what if he’s cold to them, he’s under no obligation to share his feelings with them and they have yet to earn the right. Not that they could. 

There isn’t a person alive Ellanis is willing to give that right to, not anymore.

Buzzing thoughts in his head, a pulse so loud it throbs in his ears, Ellanis wants to scream his frustration and let it rend the air with the force of him. Leave a mark no one else can claim. Ellanis’ breaths are ragged and his chest is full to bursting with air but he can’t seem to find it. His vision swims, fades and sharpens in time with his rapid heartbeat. 

“Watch out!” 

A nameless voice for a faceless attack. An arrow wizzes by Ellanis and everything clears. Ambush. Darkspawn Ellanis only now separates from the main horde seemingly all around them, how had they not noticed them? There’s so many of them, a sea of taint crashing down on them like a tidal wave and Ellanis had been so wrapped up in himself he’d let them approach. 

Ellanis had let them get close. 

Instantly his spirit brace flairs to life around his bad leg, a miasma of mana bleeding from him to swirl the dust collecting on the broken stone road. He’s a far cry better at identifying darkspawn now than he was when they entered the Deep Roads before he could at best tell their direction and maybe if it was a group. A month of living on the edge has scraped his nerves down to bare ends and he can tell they’ve outnumbered nearly two to one. 

Back of the pack and out of the way Ellanis spreads his magic towards the closest darkspawn, wrinkles his nose at the slimy sensation of the thing. He follows the trail of taint in the genlock’s blood to the wretched heart pumping it. Engorged and pulsating Ellanis grasps it and squeezes. 

Mirrors of corruption, the more darkspawn Ellanis fights the more his magic rebounds inside his own infected veins. The genlock’s heart shudders and Ellanis’ chest heaves with an echoed anguish. It falls to its knees and Oghren shatters its skull with a blow from his maul and Ellanis takes a shaky breath before moving onto the next one. 

Disrupting the hurlock’s lungs, another genlock’s bent spine, rolling a shriek’s wrist before it can plunge a dagger into Morrigan’s back. Nausea rolls in Ellanis’ gut, metallic tang fills his nose, his head pounds behind his eyes and he can hear his heartbeat in his ears. Tainted blood singing. 

He’s running out of mana. Shrieks flank them from behind and Ellanis shifts his focus to keep himself from getting run through. Falling towards the rest of the group in an effort to avoid blades and claws. Ellanis isn’t too separated, only a handful of paces between himself and Leliana and maybe a handful more between her and the front line. 

Metal crashes together and thunders through the air with their reverberations. Broken darkspawn corpses litter the narrow corridor of stone seeping their black blood into thick puddles. And still more bare their teeth and shout their warcries. 

But the darkspawn no longer outnumber them. 

Even with their small numbers, the darkspawn give no quarter. Let them gain no ground and punish Ellanis for even thinking they might. Maker grant him strength for there’s nothing left in his bones but the heavy ache of empty reserves. There’s so few of them left but those shrieks just might be enough to end their journey before it can begin.

Digging for what memory remains of his mana Ellanis reaches out for the nearest shriek with a twisted snarl. Lets his magic infiltrate the tainted heart and corrupted veins and finds the dark kernel nestled deep within the creature’s chest. Seizing it to burst it like a pocket of yellow pus on an infected wound. The taint oozes through the shriek in force and Ellanis’ heart erupts in agony, both of them screaming. 

But only one dies. Ellanis is left panting, his vision blurry, chest full of agony. But alive. Distracted but alive. Through the haze enveloping him, he doesn’t notice the second shriek materialize out of the shadows beside him, its daggers glinting in the harsh light of magma. 

Ellanis turns his head a fraction of a second too late, all he can do is watch the silver blade arc down towards his unprotected chest. 

And in the moment between heartbeats, a streak of gold slams him to the side. Yells his name and takes the blade meant for Ellanis.

Warm copper splatters against his cheek, the thick smell of iron cloying in his nose, and the visceral squelch of metal sliding out of flesh rings in his ears. Everything in Ellanis stills at the sight of Zevran falling to his knees in front of the shriek. His blood on the darkspawn’s blade. 

_ Andraste _

The thing raises its dagger to strike again, to deal a final blow, and Ellanis’ refuses to accept it. No way can this be happening. No, it's the blood loss, the… The lack of mana, he’s seeing things. 

But the dagger descends in slow motion and the world drops away from him, taking his stomach with it. 

He should have apologized. 

Ellanis’ eyes shut. And his magic takes over. 

Creeping tendrils of mana shoot from him and encapsulate the shriek, worm their way inside each and every single one of its weaknesses. Collapsing lungs and twisting veins and crushing hearts. Tearing weak muscle to shatter the bones beneath. Ellanis tears the creature apart from the inside out. It’s over in a heartbeat, a single tearing, searing heartbeat and Ellanis leaves nothing but scraps to float down to the cracked stone ground. 

“Zevran!” Knees weak and voice frayed Ellanis collapses next to Zevran, “Zevran what were you-” Ellanis bites his tongue, not the time. Focus you idiot. “Can you move? I need to see the wound but your armor is in the way.”

“Don’t worry about me, bello, there’s still a fight going on and I’m alright.” His laugh is forced around the strained creases in the corners of his mouth and eyes. “Besides if you want me out of my armor all you have to do is ask.” 

Furiously Ellanis fights down the urge to retaliate, “I don’t think you’re alright, you’re losing a lot of blood. There’s not many left, Alistair and Sten have it handled. Now let me see your wound.” He doesn’t wait for Zevran’s permission before reaching to loosen his armor enough to slide it partially upwards.

Blood has soaked through the linen of Zevran’s shirt to stick to the leather of his armor. Zevran hisses in annoyance as Ellanis moves it, the cloth jerking the edges of his wound. But it’s exposed and that’s what matters. 

Ellanis sucks in a sharp breath, it’s deep. Not particularly long, maybe only a handful of inches, but it sliced through into Zevran’s gut, the muscle and skin pulling apart on either side to leave the meat of his organs dangerously unprotected. Ellanis doesn’t have the mana to heal him completely, not right now, but maybe he can begin to close it. 

“You’re lucky it wasn’t poisoned.” He pours what little magic he has into Zevran, reversing the process he used not minutes before to rend the life from the shriek’s bones. Knitting the deepest part of the wound back together while pressing the top shut with his hands. 

Zevran coughs out a chuckle, “Could have been luckier to avoid it.” 

“It wasn’t meant for you.” Ellanis flicks his gaze from the blood seeping out from under his fingers to lock eyes with Zevran. “You could have avoided it.” 

Blood on his teeth Zevran only smiles, “We couldn’t have it hit you now could we?” 

There’s something in his eyes, something Ellanis doesn’t want to see. It’s complicated and messy and angry and soft and has nothing to do with the way Ellanis’ heart had stopped beating in his chest the moment Zevran had fallen before him. Taking a blow for him. It can’t. 

Ellanis can’t lose something like that. Not again.

“You could have.” Ellanis looks away, shaking his head so his sweaty hair falls between him and Zevran. “You keep… Why do you keep pushing?” 

Retreating is what Ellanis knows, what he’s always done. It’s safe and familiar and Ellanis has never been followed before. Under his hand Zevran’s blood slows enough to stop seeping out of his wound, Ellanis’ fingers are sticky with it where they’re pressed against Zevran’s skin. Thick and vicious.

“You don’t have to.” Ellanis is whispering but not with the edge his voice carried earlier. He… It’s safer to retreat. It’s safe to push away. “I don’t want people putting themselves between me and danger. Take a hit for me again and I won’t patch you up.” Forcing a harshness into his words, digging into a coldness he isn't sure is coming from anger. 

“I’ll keep it in mind, amarena.” Muscles bunching Zevran reaches up and tucks Ellanis’ stray hair behind his ears. “It won’t happen again.” 

Magic pulsing irregularly, heart pounding itself into a bruise. Ellanis flinches away from Zevran’s touch with enough force to pop his neck, it’s too much. Too much all at once and Ellanis had just lashed out at Zevran for the same thing earlier. 

Because what if he’s right. 

What if he’s right and Morrigan is right and Ellanis is  _ wrong _ and the sky is too far above him and the walls are too close around him and the gold of Zevran’s eyes is too easy to get lost in. Ellanis doesn’t want to think about it but it’s the only thought in his head -he can’t push it away and he can’t address it. It’s building and building and he doesn’t have a way to throw it out this time.

This time Zevran’s fingers barely caress his jaw and Ellanis jolts, head turning sharply to face Zevran. Breath catching in his aching chest. Heaving. 

“You’re too tense Ellanis.” Low voice, the heavy scent of blood on his tongue. “Unwind before you snap, for all our sakes. I, for one, can think of a few ways to keep you limber.” 

It catches him off guard. Laughter bubbles out of Ellanis, the kind he’s kept locked inside for far too long. It shakes his shoulders, flows with the absolute last of his magic sealing the majority of Zevran’s wound together. Bends Ellanis over with hysteria and surprise and weight. 

It’s more than laughter. More than mirth. More than a reaction to whatever half flirts Zevran keeps trying. Ellanis laughs and the walls recede a hair’s breadth back. 

“Can you? Just a few?”  Ellanis raises his head and meets Zevran’s eyes and for the first time since he met him, Ellanis doesn’t try to find anything in them. 

Just gets lost.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> so, dread trenches huh

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another, lighter panic attack. if you wish to skip it it's only i think three paragraphs and begins with 'impossible' and ends with 'the vhenadahl'

Ellanis finds Morrigan as soon as their camp is set up. Knowing he should have done so weeks ago before the ice between them hardened and Ellanis wants to shake himself for his stupid pride. Selfish. At least Morrigan always sets her tent up away from everyone else so no one else has to hear him. 

Cane clicking on the uneven rock of the cave Ellanis makes no move to silence his approach but Morrigan doesn’t look up. Only huffs and lifts her chin in the opposite direction. 

All of the words Ellanis had prepared die on his tongue. Twist themselves into knots and force their way back down his throat in a heavy swallow. Ellanis opens his mouth anyway, awkwardly raising his free hand to his shoulder and pinching his skin when he can’t force anything more than air from his lips. 

It shouldn’t be this hard to say he’s sorry. 

Morrigan keeps her head turned to him, the thick black strands of her hair curling in the heat of the Deep Roads. Though the ice emanating from Morrigan is still enough to freeze Ellanis’ intestines. Ellanis has known worse cold before and he gathers himself together. 

“Morrigan, I need to apologize.” Even to him the words sound hollow, empty of all the roiling and churning in his gut. “I should have said this sooner but. I didn’t.” Sighs, rakes his hand over his shoulder again. Ellanis picks his gaze up from the floor to actually look at Morrigan and finds her back still turned to him. 

He should have expected this. “I’m sorry Morrigan. I shouldn’t have said those things to anyone, especially not you. You… You’re the only one I’ve come to call my friend and I lashed out at you for something meaningless. For that, I’m deeply sorry.”

Why does it feel flat? Like the words fall from his mouth to land at his feet and sink beneath the rock to the lava below with nothing more than a whisper. The ice between them isn’t thawing and Ellanis doesn’t know how to force the words curdling in his stomach out of himself.

“Just, know I am sorry and don’t want to hurt you again. Do what you will with that.” Ellanis retreats from Morrigan’s stiff back swiftly. At this point all he’s doing is making a fool and an ass out of himself, so he does what he knows best. 

Falls back.

Alistair, Morrigan, and Leliana have watches tonight so Ellanis heads straight for his tent and buttons the flap with a frown. His throat is tight and his cheeks are hot as he reaches for the pouch he keeps his nightly tea in. Queen Asha’s lace, raspberry leaves, and elfroot all grown and ground within the alienage and it’s never tasted good. 

The discomfort gnawing at the pit of his stomach grows when his fingers graze the bottom of the pouch with his pinch. Ellanis shuts his eyes and counts down from ten, opens them and looks down at the nearly empty thing. Squints at it and turns it around in the light hoping to find some secret crevice of powdered herbs but doesn’t in the slightest. 

Ah fuck. This is just his luck huh. 

Ellanis curses himself for not picking some up in Lothering. Their apothecary may not have had much of a selection but Ellanis hadn’t even considered he’d be in the Deep Roads for long enough to need to stock up. Maybe… Grimacing Ellanis hopes Morrigan or Leliana won’t ask too many questions if he asks if they had either of those herbs on them. 

Quelling the growing nausea in his stomach Ellanis pulls the pouch shut and brews his tea, trying to avoid thinking about his dwindling supply. He has more important things to focus on, like the absolute  _ swarm _ of darkspawn under their feet. 

Taint like a river the corruption close beneath them sends shivers racing down Ellanis’ spine every time he directs his attention to it. There’s just. It’s so many darkspawn Ellanis has trouble grasping its exact size. Let alone trying to count them individually. And they’ve been inching closer to it for days now. 

But, taking his last sip of still nearly boiling hot tea, Ellanis decides it’s a problem for tomorrow.

_ 

It hasn’t even been a handful of hours since they set out before they run into the source of the massive darkspawn congregation. Ellanis doesn’t know why he followed it, not really. Is it just curiosity propelling him forwards or is something else tugging at his gut and keeping his feet heading after the muted song. 

Ellanis frowns, they’re following Branka’s trail nothing more. It just happens to overlap with whatever this is. 

And this is horrific. Stepping to the edge of the ravine Ellanis takes a deep breath before looking down even though he knows what he’s going to see before he does so. Glowing red light from cursed torches stream at the bottom of the deep gorge in a thunderous river of darkspawn. 

The stench of them hits Ellanis even where they’re standing high above them. It’s a rancid kind of odor, meat left to rot in the sun in summer or an infection oozing putrid pus. Rocks tremble with the force of the darkspawn’s march and there is nothing Ellanis can do to stop the shaking in his bones. 

How are they supposed to fight this?

Before Ellanis can freeze further all the air in his lungs is stolen by the beat of huge wings. Metallic tingling fills his nose and the scent is stronger than ever -old blood corrupted inside veins, a heart pumping nothing but filth. A roar reverberates through Ellanis’ empty, tight chest as the Archdemon soars past them. 

Eyes watering from the heat, the stench, the terrible noise of the thing Ellanis finds himself rooted to the spot.  _ Andraste they can’t fight that. _

Impossible. Ellanis thought himself familiar with fear. An intimate knowledge of despair lingers inside his skin, sunk through all the way to his bones, his soul. Long ago he thought he knew the way blood can curdle and hearts can seize and lungs can falter. Living his life huddled into himself out of terror for being found Ellanis thought he knew what it meant to be afraid. 

Ellanis knew nothing.

Now Ellanis’ heart hammers against his ribs in a bid to escape the hysteria crawling from his too-fast breaths. Shakes like a leaf blown from the vhenadahl during a storm and Ellanis has known fear like this only once before. Metal jingles and Ellanis can’t distinguish it from past or present and his lungs ache but he isn’t breathing and Ellanis’ temples are pounding.

It’s here and now and yet it isn’t because he’s in the rain and there are darkspawn or are they templars. Frantic heartbeats ring in his ears and Ellanis shuts his eyes. Hands on his shoulders are a memory or are they real and why is this touch so warm? So familiar?

There's no air in his lungs, just an ache when he gasps for breath. Nothing, there is nothing but the solid blood in his veins and the knowledge of what true terror tastes like on the back of his tongue. Bitter as bile and twice as sharp. Ellanis is nothing in the face of it. Just trembles. Like the boy he was in an alienage, it's spring and Ellanis is filled with awesome fear. It consumes him from the inside out. 

And the only hope he has is holding him in his arms and

_ The vhenadahl is blooming.  _

_ Sweet petals fall in the gentle rain, littering the uneven streets with puddles filled with pink and white buds. Spring is beautiful even when it means days like this. Ellanis keeps his window pulled tightly shut and the curtains in the main room firmly pulled together. Today isn’t one to draw attention. _

_ Jingling footsteps ring out through the alienage and Ellanis flinches with each one. Plate metal plinking with the rain giving him shivers. Templars sniffing in the streets but they’re not stopping to smell the blossoms drifting from the vhenadahl.  _

_ They’re hunting. Searching for apostates in a spring raid, one they repeat every year. Never on the same day and never by the same people the only consistency is the fear it strikes in Ellanis’ heart. Stopping it with each rattling step. _

_ Attie warned him about it yesterday, she overheard the Arlessa talking with one of her handmaidens about it while working at her estate. A lucky warning for him and for Noure.  _

_ Ellanis’ bedroom window opens with a chill breeze and he freezes in place. Tenses every muscle in his body.  _ Andraste not today. _ He can’t, Ellanis won’t be taken. Not now, not ever. Please. _

_ Spinning on his good heel Ellanis stops in his tracks when he’s greeted not by a breastplate embossed with a sword surrounded by flame but by the impish, slightly apologetic grin of Noure. And Ellanis instantly relaxes. No harm will come to them together.  _

_ “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” Noure steps out of the window frame and Ellanis has to shake himself for his foolishness. The window opens up onto the second floor and is mostly hidden by their neighbor’s roof. Templars wouldn’t give it a second thought let alone try to get in through it.  _

_ He’s just being paranoid. Sits on the edge of his bed to try and calm the racing of his heart. “It’s alright. I was being stupid.” Ellanis drinks in the sight of Noure, the flush in their colorless cheeks and the light in their eyes. And he furrows his brow at the dryness of their clothes. “Didn’t you get wet from the rain?” _

_ Noure laughs and it’s sweeter than chantry bells ringing, “And get these clothes dirty are you kidding? Attie just fixed them last week she’d skin me alive.”  _

_ “You better hope no one saw you.” Stomach in knots just from the thought, toes curling against his bed where he’s sitting.  _

_ Ellanis’ anxiety must have been palatable in the air between them because Noure flops down on the bed beside him. “Hey, it’s no big deal. Not even noticeable really. Besides no one saw and I didn’t think the raid would be today.”  _

_ Sincerity in Noure’s mismatched eyes. Red and gold warm enough to melt the worry eating at Ellanis’ insides. “Fine.” It isn’t, but Ellanis can live with Noure’s recklessness if they’re looking at him like that.  _

_ “Sit with me?” Noure relaxes further into Ellanis’ bed and Ellanis tries not to let his heart flip too much.  _

_ The lightness in his chest is new and too hopeful for Ellanis. Noure’s kiss had tasted of sunshine and smoke from festival lanterns last week and Ellanis hasn’t had the courage to kiss them again. But he wants to. _

_ Andraste does he want to kiss Noure again.  _

_ Always impatient Noure, apparently, decides Ellanis is taking too long just looking at them and they tug Ellanis’ arm so he falls, sideways, beside them. His back to their chest. It’s warm, warmer than just spring air can account for.  _

_ Noure feels like home.  _

_ Scooting closer Ellanis allows Noure to drape an arm over his chest. Protecting him from the rain and raid outside. Simple and enough for Ellanis’ chest to feel tight. Even now he’s afraid.  _

_ Afraid for himself, if he should be found out. Arrested on the streets as he is in his darkest nightmares. Stone walls taller than any alienage surrounding him in a perfect, inescapable Circle haunting in their rigidity. Casting shadows heavier than any hope. _

_ The scent of rain lingers in the crook of Noure’s neck and mixes with the sweet smell of the vhenadahl’s blossoms. Ellanis picks up their hand and raises it, his thumb resting in the middle of Noure’s palm. Thin bones shifting under his touch their fingers splayed against the dark background of Ellanis’ ceiling, Ellanis commits the sight to memory.  _

_ Water plinks on metal outside his window and both of them shiver. Every year, right after the festival, the hunt begins. Templars and nobles with sport on their minds come to sweep through the alienage and leave tracks of trampled white blooms. Ellanis focuses on the bend of Noure’s fingers, the softness of their palm, the warmth of their chest against his back.  _

_ Silence. Rain hits glass and armor but both of them are dry. Noure shifts their hand on Ellanis’ hip and curls their fingers deeper into his skin. Closing his eyes Ellanis knows Noure is seething, wants nothing more than to burst outside into the rain and let the shemlen know they’re not welcome here. But Ellanis also knows their fingers are tangling with his in the air above them and neither of them are willing to risk this. _

_ Afraid for Noure. Their reckless pursuit of freedom chills Ellanis’ blood and stills the air in his lungs in a way he doesn’t have words for. It is a bone-deep kind of terror. Because if Ellanis loses Noure he isn’t sure what would be left behind. _

Breaths coming too fast and too hard Ellanis’ vision goes fuzzy and grey. His chest is empty and there’s nothing left behind and there’s a river of corruption beneath him. Puddles with trampled blossoms. Torches burning tainted fire. 

Hands on his shoulder making him flinch, twisting desperately with wide eyes. 

“Ellanis, look at me.” Smooth voice and worried dark gold eyes. Zevran’s hand is outstretched and Ellanis can put two and two together even when his mind is reeling. “Match your breathing to mine, slowly.”

Zevran’s chest moves evenly and Ellanis focuses on the steady rise and fall, doing as Zevran says and matching the movements. Slowing his breaths and easing the racing of his thoughts is easier when he has something else to focus on beyond the screaming in his head. 

They kneel, mirroring each other, on the ledge for far longer than Ellanis wants. Zevran doesn’t try to touch him again like he knows it wouldn’t be welcome. Instead, he just keeps breathing, his eyes on Ellanis’ in a weight Ellanis finds unsettlingly comforting. There shouldn’t be anything relieving about Zevran watching him so closely, so intimately.

It isn’t as if Ellanis could hide anything right now. Ribs cracked open by the beating of his heart to leave himself unprotected. Bare. Naked in a way Ellanis hoped he’d never be before anyone else ever again.

“I’m fine.” The snap of Ellanis voice is undermined slightly by the waviness in it but Zevran nods at him anyway. “We need to keep moving. Branka shouldn’t be too much further ahead.” 

Maker, Ellanis’ head is on fire. Gritting his teeth Ellanis pushes himself up with his cane, waiting for the others to start walking. The path continues to their right, sloping downwards into darkness, though for how much further none of them are sure. They’ve been down here for so long already Ellanis is beginning to forget what the sun on his skin felt like. 

Only a few backward glances are tossed his way and Ellanis is grateful none of them come with any questions attached. Alistair leads the way into the partially caved-in tunnel and he’s followed uniformly, and a little too quickly.

The sight of the Archdemon must have rattled them all. 

But only Ellanis had been reduced by it. 

Breathing through his nose harshly Ellanis unclenches his jaw. He told Zevran the truth, he’s  _ fine. _ And he’ll continue to be fine the rest of the way through the Deep Roads, he has to be. Everything he knows, those precious few people he loves, Thedas itself is needing Ellanis to remain strong. Standing upright. 

Andraste will guide him, she’s never abandoned him. For all he’s thought she has. Ellanis shakes his head and his vision swims, this isn’t the time or place. Focus. 

“Do you like peppermint?” Relaxed and unhurried Zevran’s question washes over Ellanis and startles him from his thoughts. Looking at him through halfway opened eyes Zevran is the only one staying back close to Ellanis. And he’s asking him about peppermint.

Ellanis blinks. “I? Do I like peppermint?” It’s so far off base to everything around them Ellanis can’t do more than stop in his tracks. Throwing him completely off guard and drowning out everything else in his head. 

Does he like peppermint? “Yes, I have a friend back in the alienage who loves tea and she makes a peppermint tea during the winter. It’s good.” Ellanis nearly doesn’t recognize his own voice, he sounds… Cracked and hollow like the wind of deep winter. It matches the weakness in his limbs or the sweat congealing along his spine. 

Zevran doesn’t mention it. Just nods as if they’re having a conversation in a market, “In Antiva they have these little peppermint candies. They’re hard but sweet and even in summer they don’t melt. They’re one of the things I miss from my city.” One step at a time Zevran moves forward, Ellanis walking with him. 

Hands moving as he talks, a story spinning from Zevran’s lips. A little boy stealing candy during the summer and not getting caught by humans but by true crows. Sharing his spoils with the birds only after having most of the sweets pecked away. 

It makes Ellanis giggle quietly despite himself. The image of a young, fresh-faced Zevran swarmed by a flock of fierce crows after a victory is light-hearted enough for him to begin to relax. Ellanis flicks his gaze to Zevran in a moment of… What is this? It’s warm but it’s jaded, soothing but on edge. 

Companionship lined with wariness. 

Zevran’s smile is genuine and his tale lifts Ellanis from the dark thoughts he’d fallen into but Ellanis can’t trust him. Can he? There’s so much at stake and Ellanis has been burned by reckless fire before. 

Yet. Ellanis thinks of the way Zevran shouted his name during the ambush only yesterday. Taking a blade to the gut meant for Ellanis, one Ellanis should check up on again tonight. There hadn’t been any hesitation on Zevran’s part, Maferath’s balls he’d even tried to reassure Ellanis the wound was nothing. 

Are those the actions of a liar? The first moves in a long game played by an assassin well versed in the rules of love and war? Of blood rushing in both longing and horror?

Ellanis doesn’t know what to think. There’s too much  _ to _ think about. Even if he could trust Zevran he isn’t sure he’d want what it means to do so. Opening himself up to ruin again isn’t something Ellanis could handle and he knows it.

“Ellanis?” Zevran calls him out of his own thoughts with ease, the timbre of his voice reaching in to pluck Ellanis’ attention with only a word. “Tell me of your friend you mentioned. I tell so many stories of Antiva, another would make myself homesick.” 

What’s one story?

Catching Zevran’s eyes Ellanis waits a heartbeat before he decides. “Her name is Attie and she’s the best damn seamstress in all of Denerim. We met before I can remember-”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for taking so long to update! i got slammed in the face by uhhh life in general honestly but i'm back hopefully for awhile!


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